I really wanted to focus on everything that had happened in that time-stop. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to yell, vent or think about the consequences. What I did know was that I didn’t have time to do any of those things, as I was in the middle of an important meeting. How important? Well, the first item on the agenda had awarded me a city.

“The second order of business is the monies found in the er… previous Lord’s treasury,” Mayor Andre said, reading off the paper in front of him.

“How much did Lady Valarie take with her?” I asked.

“Actually… very little. It seems that recent events had increased Lord Marseu’s… concerns for security, and he’d locked up the majority of the treasury while he was gone. With him holding the only key…”

Everybody stared at the mayor, who wilted under the attention. “So the Barony was operating for the last week without funds?” I eventually asked.

“Some funds were left available to officials, but essentially yes.” The mayor glanced nervously at the Inquisitor. “That fact leant a certain urgency to the need for some sort of succession plan. I wouldn’t want to presume, but I think that might have helped prompt his Highness’s granting the Charter.”

Somehow, I kept the smile off my face. That paranoid idiot had really helped me out.

“So under the supervision of Lord Dunnar, workers broke open the vault and we’ve been inventorying the contents.”

“Does the money belong to the city, or to Lady Valarie?” I asked.

“The case could be made either way,” the mayor said, looking again at Inquisitor Dunnar. “Her Ladyship has not yet pressed a claim, and given what we’ve discovered, she may not want to.”

“What have you found?” Noah asked.

“There is a considerable amount of gold - almost a third of the total - that isn’t listed on the books.”

“More money than we thought doesn’t sound bad,” Councillor Balend put in.

“The implication though, is that this money was acquired by illegal means,” I pointed out. “And the tax hasn’t been paid either.”

“Exactly. If Lady Valarie was to claim the monies, she would be admitting her complicity in the very crimes that your petition accused him of.”

Inquisitor Dunnar spoke up. “His Majesty has stated that he will make no final decision until he’s heard from the Lady. In the meantime, consider the funds to have been awarded to the City.”

I winced, but only on the inside. Money that might get taken away later was almost a liability. Still, it might not.

“I presume the King’s tax has been taken from the additional proceeds?” I asked. Faces winced around almost all the table. Nobody likes paying taxes. The two merchants had faces that were particularly pained.

“Ah… I suppose that would be the best course of action,” the mayor managed to get out, carefully not looking at Dunnar.

“A wise decision,” the Inquisitor intoned, giving me a glance of annoyance. Had that been a test? A pretty weak one if so. Unlike the others, I was actually ecstatic about the idea of sending off a massive tax payment.

I had expected the treasury to be empty. We’d collect taxes of course, but in two months we’d be showing up to the King with empty hands and budget promises. Now, we’d be showing up with a big, fat cash payment in the bank.

55,000 gold added to Treasury.

1 Territory Point has been awarded!

I blinked, and then blinked the message away. Okay… I glanced at the documents on the table. That amount was the sum that the Baron had legally acquired. There was still the untaxed 30,000 gold — that would presumably be added to the treasury once the tax was assessed and the remainder awarded to us.

After talking about the money we moved on to where to keep it. The tower was the traditional centre of power in the town, so it seemed a natural idea for us to move in and take it over, but I had another idea.

“The King will be sending troops soon,” I said. “We don’t want to mix them up with the Guard, and it seems to me that the tower is perfectly placed to be the command centre for defending the wall.”

Dunnar looked at me curiously. He was naturally suspicious of me, and any gifts that I might come bearing.

“Are you saying we should build a new Council house?” Cheney asked, perking up for the first time now his profession had become involved.

“Yes. Something built for the purpose off the main square,” I said. Setting up shop in the tower wouldn’t be bad, (I remembered the working plumbing), but it would be isolating and intimidating. If I wanted to get participatory democracy going, people would have to be invited.

We didn’t come to a decision on that one, but Cheney agreed to come up with some construction proposals.

“Now,” I said. “I’d like to discuss some trade possibilities.” The merchants leaned forward, always eager to hear about a new opportunity. The others just looked confused.

“We should be getting a delegation from the Tribes in the very near future,” I explained. “They’re interested in setting up a trade route with their nearest village.”

The merchant’s eyes gleamed, but they deferred to Dunnar as the Inquisitor spoke up.

“Treating with foreigners is beyond this Council’s authority,” he said with just a touch of condescension. “Only the King can decide if negotiations are to be held.”

I smiled. “Actually, if you check our Charter, it specifically authorises us to conduct mercantile and other agreements with nearby settlements.”

He stopped, suddenly unsure of himself. Yeah, he hasn’t read the contract.

“Did you want me to show you the relevant section?” I asked politely.

He narrowed his eyes. “I do remember something of that sort,” he admitted. “But that cannot infringe on the King’s prerogatives regarding foreign nations!”

“The Tribe’s aren’t a nation though, are they?” I countered. “Not in the King’s eyes at least. I understand the lack of acknowledgement is quite the sore point with them.”

“Yes, but…”

“So the nearest Tribal settlement is just that, a nearby settlement. The Charter is quite clear.” I paused to let that sink in. “The wording was authorised by his Majesty… are you saying he made a mistake?”

You have defeated Reece Dunnar in a Tier 3 Social Contest! You have earned 25 XP

Social penalties have been waived.

I let him off the hook for losing as we had a long meeting ahead of us and he’d be fuming if he couldn’t speak against me. He took the gift with ill grace, but the conversation now moved on to the actual deal. I admitted I had no real idea of what they would have on offer, or what they would need.

“Spoken Wood,” Cheney said. “That’s what we need from them.”

“What’s that?” I asked. The merchants were both nodding thoughtfully at the idea, so I knew it was a good one.

“The Tribals don’t cut down the trees - don’t like us doing it much either,” Cheney explained. “But trees get old, need to be thinned out, and wood’s too useful to do without. So they’ve got a [Profession], called Tree-speakers or some such, that can talk to the trees, get them to shed branches or even pull themselves out of the ground.”

“Sounds nice,” I said. “But does that make the wood better?”

“You bet. They talk out all the knots, get the grain moved how they like it, even shape it into tools before it falls off. Planks if they want to trade. It’s mighty fine wood. Never saw Spoken Wood that was less than [Perfect] grade.”

“It’s rare to see it in the market,” Councillor Balend put in. “Since there’s no official trade, you mainly see it as completed tools coming in from the North.”

“Great. And what are we going to offer them?” I asked.

“I don’t think they have many metalworkers,” Noah mused. “I wouldn’t be surprised if they were limited to Dungeon produced works, and what they trade from other nations. Steel and Silver-steel goods should be welcomed.”

“That’s great,” I said. “Councillor Balend, Since Noah is going to be working on the budget, can you sound out the Merchant Guild and get some proposed prices and available numbers of goods for when the negotiations start?”

“Of course,” he said. “And, please, call me Delmar. We’re all equals around this table, are we not?” He glanced at Noah, clearly trying to convey something without words.

“Sure thing,” I said. “And remember to contact all the merchants. We can’t let this historic trade deal get caught up in accusations of special dealing and corruption.”

“Of course,” he replied, with slightly less enthusiasm this time.

I made some notes for the minutes, and then we moved on to other business.

“Damn!” I said, sinking back into our comfortable chair. “Thank the System for [Endurance]!”

Felicia looked over at me, amused, from where she was sorting the fruits of her [Alchemical] labours.

“You don’t have [Endurance] back home? How did you do anything?”

“We just had regular endurance, and it wasn’t as good,” I admitted. “We got tired a lot. Oh, and we had coffee. That helped.”

“Sounds terrible. Did things go well?”

“Yeah, actually. Dunnar complained a lot, I had to win three Social Contests against him.”

“Three? How was he able to go up against you three times?”

“Oh, I waived the penalties each time,” I said dismissively. “If I’d kept them up, he would have waited out the twenty-four hours and then gone complaining to the King.”

“Won’t he do that anyway?”

“Perhaps, but it looks a lot better for me if I didn’t take advantage. And the King will be getting a big fat payment, so I think he’ll be feeling positively about me.”

“Don’t count on the gratitude of Nobles,” Felicia said seriously.

“Is that a saying here? It sounds like it should be.”

“It is back in Oakway, I haven’t heard it anywhere else,” she replied. “But I think it’s good advice, especially after Anchorbury.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not counting on his gratitude, I’m counting on his greed. I want him to think I can get him more money if he lets me get on with it.” I looked over at her. “How are the preparations going, by the way?”

“Slowly, but we’ve got plenty of time, don’t we?” she said. “I still need to get my [Alchemy] skill up to make the higher grades, but these will make a nice base to work from.”

“Our slot is coming up tomorrow,” I said with some satisfaction. “We should make some progress in resource collection then.”

“No politicking?”

“Not tomorrow, not unless the trade delegation shows up.” Felicia gave me a look and started to say something. “—and I’m supposed to get a warning before they do,” I interrupted.

“Good - we’ve all been looking forward to completing the thing.”

I nodded and then laughed. “It feels weird to actually look forward to combat and traps, but I really do after sitting in a room talking for six hours.”

“You must be getting used to life here then,” Felicia snarked.

“I guess I must be,” I said thoughtfully. “That reminds me, I didn’t tell you about my other meeting.”

I had to hand it to Fyskal — judging by results, there wasn’t a better way to get me to stop worrying about earth-shattering revelations than to force me to manage five egos through starting up a new city. I’d actually forgotten about the whole thing — not literally, thanks to [Memorise] I could repeat every word — but the conversation had slipped my mind until now.

Retelling the experience to Felicia, I was struck by fear. Just what had they done to me — or should I be worried about what had happened to me before they found me? Assuming, of course, that any of it had been true.

Felicia was much more interested in the Territory stuff, especially once I used illusions to show her the screens.

“I never knew that Nobles had this available!” she exclaimed. “What are you going to do with it?”

“I think I’ll wait until I have more points, and a better understanding of all the options,” I said. “Did you know that different countries have different [Professions]?”

She nodded. “Travellers from other countries often have [Professions] that don’t show up in the [Status]. They don’t stop working outside the country, but you can only take them if you’re in the country.”

“Well, at some stage I’ll take a look and see what’s available for officials… but right now, I’m more concerned with whether I’m dead or not.”

“Of course you’re not dead, silly! Didn’t you get a good idea in Anchorbury about what the living dead look like?”

I laughed. It was true, I had seen a variety of undead back there. “You know what I mean. If my soul was just lying around for the gods to take… I had family back home, were they all dead as well?”

“But you already knew you weren’t ever going back,” Felicia pointed out. “You just didn’t want to acknowledge it.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“You read the book about all the other Champions — well not all, but a bunch. None of them ever went home, they all made new lives here.”

“That’s…” I protested, but it was true. I’d thought that they must have all just given up, or found life better here… but all of them? Some of them must have tried harder than I had.

For the first time, I started thinking seriously about living the rest of my life here.