"I bought this map from Ulriga," Pydaso replied. "I don't know if more detailed maps have been made of this region, but they certainly aren't available publically. Only the Duke's library might have them, or perhaps that of the King in Dorastiz, but neither of those would be for sale. So this is the best I could find."

Duvas interrupted, "How much will it cost us?"

The merchant smiled. "You don't need to worry about its payment. Consider it a gift from me to celebrate our ongoing trading relationship."

The majordomo chuckled. "I never knew you could be so generous, or I would have preferred trading with you even in the past."

Pydaso gave a loud laugh. "Nobody has ever called me generous as far as business is concerned. However, I've never met someone like Lord Kivamus before, and my association with Tiranat is now the most special one I have anywhere in the kingdom, so this is a small gesture from me to keep it like that."

Kivamus grinned. "Well, thank you for this, Pydaso. It will be very helpful to us."

"I hope so, milord," the merchant nodded. "Before I leave, I wanted to ask if you have some more coal to sell."

Kivamus snorted. "Of course we do. Tiranat is a coal mining village, after all. Why do you ask that?"

Pydaso shrugged. "The thing is, I met Trevalo in the market square earlier, and he told me that he has already bought six wagonloads of coal from you, so I didn't know if you would even have enough coal left to sell right now, especially right after the slow months of the winter when people don't mine coal here. Anyway, earlier I wasn't even sure if I'd be able to sell all the iron ingots here, but seeing both of my wagons empty when coming here made me think that I should also buy some coal from you to sell in Cinran or Ulriga - assuming you still had it." He lowered his voice. "I know the goods I am already carrying will account for the bulk of my trade on this trip, at least in value, but returning with empty wagons from Tiranat will raise quite a few eyebrows on the way."

Kivamus nodded. "That's true. Although I've heard that the demand for coal is low this time because of the bad harvests, so you won't be able to sell it at a good price anyway."

He thought for a moment. While Tiranat was always short on gold these days, this really was a special trading relationship, and instead of price gouging, he should try to make sure Pydaso remained buoyant enough to continue coming here. It wasn't like there was some other merchant they could fence paper and medicine through, and with how corrupt everyone seemed to be in this world, something like half of any traveling merchant's profit, or perhaps even more, might be going just to pay the bribes and taxes to enter and exit a town."

He looked at the portly merchant. "Tell you what, you already gave us a generous gift of the map, so we'll give you the coal at a half rate this time to return the favor. For two wagon loads it would have cost around 24 gold, but we'll sell you the same amount of coal for 12 gold. That should cover the cost of any bribes you have to pay on the road, even with low coal prices these days."

Duvas frowned at him after hearing that, but remained quiet.

Pydaso looked surprised for a moment before he grinned. "Thank you for this, milord! That will help me a lot! Usually, when I am only carrying things which are above board, I prefer not to pay any bribe, even if it would lead to the guards demanding to check my wagons." He scratched his scraggly beard. "In fact, I think you'd told me that you had noticed the same thing when you were coming from Ulriga, when I was held up outside the gates of Cinran for quite a while, and that was the reason you chose me to travel with you to Tiranat."

The merchant shrugged. "Anyway, when I'm sure that the guards won't find anything illicit, I let them do it, especially when I am not short on time. However this time, you know very well that we can't let anyone find what I'm carrying, so I might have to pay higher than normal rates to make sure no town guard tries to check my wagon. I do have a good place to hide those things, but it's better not to take such a risk."

"That's a good idea," Kivamus said.

"I agree with this too," Duvas nodded. "It's safer this way."

The majordomo stood up. "Well, I'll go and tell the servants to start loading your wagons with coal. You can pay us the gold after that."

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"I'll come with you," Pydaso said as followed Duvas outside the hall.

Kivamus exhaled, remembering that the tax collector should be coming soon to the manor hall. He sighed loudly. Well, time to pay back nearly all the gold they had earned.

***

Duvas had returned to the hall before long, after taking the payment and leaving the merchant outside to oversee the loading of his wagon with coal. Kivamus had been waiting for Ustaimo to arrive, but didn't want him to call him here, in case he was still trying to get the knight to calm down.

The majordomo had also brought the full amount of gold they would need to pay the tax, and it was kept in a satchel in front of them. That included the 687 gold from the very last of his savings from his past life in Ulriga, as well as nearly 400 gold which they had earned from Pydaso.

Duvas looked wistfully at the gold. "We rarely gather this much gold at the same time, and it is usually in the autumn. Which means we only ever see it for a few days before the previous baron had to take it to Cinran to pay the tax."

Kivamus nodded. "I'm just happy that we managed to gather all the gold on time. While Tuilas may not have been able to force us to give him slaves for the shortfall, it still wouldn't have ended well."

"That is true enough," the majordomo agreed. "The Count might very well have sent more knights in a week to force the issue in that case. Anyway, at least we don't have to pay the tax on this new revenue until the autumn, since the current taxes are only for the year which ended last autumn. Selling coal to Trevalo for nearly 70 gold, and the total sale to Pydaso for around 600 gold, means we have to pay around 180 gold as tax on it this autumn, at the new rate of 25%. I need to add all this to our revenue ledger too."

After making sure that there was nobody else in the hall and confirming that the inner door was still closed - with two guards keeping an eye in the inner corridor and waiting to inform him when the tax collector had exited his room to come here - Kivamus looked at Duvas and smirked. "Taxes? What taxes?" He laughed. "Taxes don't have to be paid on something which doesn't even exist."

"Huh?" The majordomo frowned. "What are you talking about? Of course we have to pay taxes on the barony's whole revenue!"

Kivamus grinned. "Aren't you forgetting something?" He lowered his voice further. "Those products will be sold by that Ulrigan trader - after he buys them from a visiting sea merchant. I don't see any reason for Tiranat to have anything to do with it."

Duvas looked speechless.

Kivamus smirked before he explained. "We have taken the best precautions to make sure nobody knows either of those things came from Tiranat. That means there wasn't any official sale or transaction at all. So why would we pay the taxes if we didn't even sell anything?"

He shrugged. "As far as the count or even the duke know, those things will be coming from some new sea merchant in Ulriga. Let them try to find him and get taxes from him. Actually," he paused for a moment to think, before adding, "I don't even know how the tax system works for sea merchants, but either way, it doesn't have anything to do with us. From what I see, all we have to pay taxes on is the 70 gold we earned from Trevalo for the coal, as well as the furs and coal we sold Pydaso. That will be 25% of uh... 260 gold, I think. So 65 gold is the tax we owe on it this autumn. That's it."

Duvas closed his mouth again after trying to speak for a few times, but words seemed to have failed him. Finally, he grinned. "That's... That's brilliant! I never even thought about it that way. Wait, doesn't this mean we won't have to pay any taxes for those two products at all, even in the coming months?"

Kivamus shrugged with a knowing grin. "Until we keep hiding the fact that we are the source of them, yes, we don't have to pay taxes on any of those things at all. Eventually, we will have to reveal it, but that's a long time away. Of course, this is being done off the books. So don't write anything about the income from those things in that revenue ledger."

Duvas nodded. "This will add up a lot to our earnings!" He shook his head in wonder. "You really are a genius, my lord..." he breathed. "If we somehow manage to sell those things regularly - with nobody finding out about its source - this is going to help us tremendously, especially with how many new ways you keep finding to spend gold."

Kivamus laughed. "That's the very reason we are in this position today. Anyway, it's not like our expenses are getting lower any time soon. We have to pay Trevalo and the Kirnos fish merchant soon, then we have to buy more food for the village, and before long, we have to start paying the guards as well. That would mean the rest of the villagers would also demand to be paid directly in coins instead of the grain and coal we are giving them. But yes, it's a good start to get enough gold for those things."

That was the moment when the inner door opened and a guard walked to him. "The tax collector has just exited his room and is coming here. Sir Tuilas seems to be staying back though."

"Good. Go and tell the other guard to continue keeping a watch outside Tuilas' room and to follow him around if he leaves it. He is not to be allowed to go to the upper floor. When you are done, return here with Ustaimo."

It was time to pay the tax and to finally be done with it.