Udo was busy with paperwork in the Aksum port when a Paulsland sailor came in and said, “Diplomat Udo, I have come straight from Five Village Island, and I have terrible news. The Himyarites started an invasion of Paulsland. The invasion started many weeks ago, and I am sorry it took so long to give you the message.”

Udo frowned, but inwardly he was furious, not at the messenger, but at the Himyarites. Udo was a diplomat and had learned from King Paul that he was not allowed to show his anger, so instead, he frowned, calmed his heart, and asked, “Do you have orders for me?”

“Yes, King Paul sent me with the entirety of the Paulsland treasury, several tons of spices, and sugars, a few hundred pounds of perfume, and talents of gold, silver, copper, and brass. Alongside this are several hundred crossbows with thousands of bolts, three trebuchets, and the first ship successfully built in the dry docks. With these, you are to hire the Aksum army to capture Muza.”

Udo nodded and asked, “Should they try to capture more cities after Muza?”

“No, that should be sufficient. If Aksum has Muza, the Himyarites should forget about Paulsland.”

“How bad is the war?”

The sailor frowned and said, “After pulling in every soldier and militiaman in Paulsland, we have around the same amount of soldiers as the Himyarites. Give our children ten years to grow up, heck even five, and we will be in a much better position. But Paulsland just doesn’t have the people to fight the massive populations and armies of these northern civilizations. In twenty or thirty years, we will be able to support legions of soldiers and dozens of legions of militia, but we have to fight off this attack first.”

Udo nodded. Aksum was one of the smaller northern nations, but when he first arrived, he was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of people in the country. Paulsland just didn’t have enough people yet, so it was a tempting target for a nation that could just throw soldiers at the problem. To counter that, Udo’s job was to hire an army to make the enemies of Paulsland forget all about Paulsland, so they could buy years for the younger generation to grow up.

Udo always knew this was a possibility. He spent the last few years getting to know the nobles of Aksum and giving gifts to the king. The former had produced some close relationships, but the latter probably hasn’t been noticed. The king was something of an ungrateful miser.

With his connections to Paulsland, Udo had been able to help some of the nobles enter into the spice trade, helped others who were dealing with persistent sickness, and developed friendships with several simply because of their shared joy of hunting. Udo even married the daughters of concubines of three separate nobles.

Udo considered the sailor in front of him and said, “Are the sailors still on the ship?”

“Of course. All the wealth of Paulsland is on the ship.”

“Good. If anyone asks about the ship, tell them that I have brought weapons from my homeland, and do not mention the war.”

“What? Why? We need to hire soldiers.”

“If I, Udo, hire soldiers for a personal war, then I will be able to hire them at a better price than if King Paul hires soldiers because he is fighting a desperate war. I need you to tell the rest of your crew that everything they do is for me because I hired them. We can not afford for the truth to be told.” And so Udo began preparing a mix of lies and truth so that he could meet the desires of his government. He was a diplomat, after all.

The sailor nodded. He had been a sailor long enough to know about supply and demand. If a desperate person had an urgent need for something, the price was much higher. He would inform the other sailors and trust that news of the war between Paulsland and the Himyarites would spread too slowly to interfere with this transaction; after all, merchant ships took weeks to go from one place to another, and most of them would skip Aksum for the better markets of Rome.

As the sailor left, Udo began sending messages to his noble friends to meet with him about a wonderful opportunity that had just presented itself, and if they worked together, they could become fantastically rich. Udo intentionally did not invite the King of Aksum, as the man was a miser, and excluding a miser from a business deal was the cheapest way to get them to join your business.

Because Aksum did not have communications towers, largely because their king was too cheap to build them, it took a week for Udo to get a reply back from the various nobles. All agreed to come and hear Udo’s plan. It wasn’t a surprise. Udo was the gatekeeper to Paulsland spice, medicine, sugar, and piston-powered pump trade. If that trade was not the biggest source of income for these nobles, then it was their second-biggest source of income, and so they had to keep Udo happy.

A week after Udo received the replies, the nobles showed up at his villa one by one. Some were there to take advantage of this new opportunity; others were there to placate their friend, as they felt they were overextended. As they waited, they were given the best wines. Udo had found out that it was best to negotiate with people who were buzzed.

Once they all arrived and had some refreshments and more wine, Udo started the meeting, “Through some of my nation’s merchants, I have found some information that we need to move on quickly. Pirates have attacked several ports of the Himyarites and somehow left the ports burning and in ruins. This has forced the Himyarites to spread their army out, leaving some of their ports vulnerable, including Muza. I am looking for some nobles to work with to capture Muza for Aksum.”

The nobles were shocked. Several of their mouths dropped open. When they came here today, they thought they were coming to talk about some new good to buy and sell, not to talk about war. Every noble was quiet for a long moment as their minds shifted gears from considering merchandise to considering mercenaries. What would it cost, and what could they gain.

The most powerful noble, Ousanas, was the first to wrap his mind around Udo’s proclamation and the first to speak, “Let's say we go to war and capture Muza. What’s in it for us?”

“Himyarite is the land of frankincense and myrrh. They have held the recipe and ingredients as closely guarded secrets for centuries. The city of Muza produces both; if we capture it, everyone in this room will be able to capitalize on it. Perhaps you will be able to produce them in your own land.”

Ousanas tilted his head and then asked, “What’s in it for you?”

“Paulsland sells its own perfume. If you take Muza, that will disrupt Himyarite perfume production for a while, allowing Paulsland to sell its perfumes for a higher price. Furthermore, I will transplant whatever plants make their perfumes to Paulsland, as I am sure you will bring those plants to Aksum. We will all gain access to wealth. Furthermore, it means that when ships stop in Muza going to and from Rome, they will be paying fees to the nobles in this room, instead of the nobles of Himyarite.”

Ousanas smiled and said, “I like that idea,” then his smile disappeared, and he asked, “But how will we fund an army?”

“That’s no problem. I have been able to save many talents of gold, and I can pay for the cost of the army. But I am not a noble of Aksum. If I tried to raise an army, no one would respond. But you men can raise an army without anyone batting an eyelash. We all have a lot to gain by invading Muza, so for every coin, you spend hiring soldiers, I will spend two.”

The nobles were silent as they considered this, then started nodding. Once it was clear they all wanted to be part of this invasion, Ousanas asked, “How quickly do you want your army?”

“By the end of the month. The Himyarites are spread out to deal with the pirates. If we strike now, it will be months before they can pull their forces together to fight us, and by then, we will already have taken Muza.”

“How can you know that?”

“I have three trebuchets, able to throw two hundred pound rocks over six hundred feet.”

The room went silent for a long moment before Ousanas asked, “Why do you have those?”

“When I saw the opportunity to take Muza, I had some engineers from Paulsland make them. They don’t have the range of ballistae, but they can throw a lot more weight, and they are normal pieces of equipment in the Paulsland military. Outside of Paulsland, Aksum will be the first nation to use them.”

The nobles each breathed a sigh of relief. Then they smiled, realizing that they would be getting such a powerful piece of weaponry before any of their enemies. And so now that they had the major points agreed upon, they began hammering out the details.

In the coming days, the nobles went to their territories and began openly raising armies. Word quickly reached King Zoskales, who was not happy at all. He sent a message demanding the nobles come to see him immediately to prove they were not rebelling. Although Udo was not included in that list, he naturally went with his friends. It was now time to get the miser king involved in this war.

The day came, and the nobles were brought before their king, and he asked, “Why are you gathering all those soldiers? Are you planning a rebellion?”

Udo stepped forward and said, “If I may speak.”

King Zoskales was confused for a moment and asked, “Who are you?”

Udo wanted to roll his eyes. He sent this king gifts of gold and spices, and he still didn’t remember him, “I am the ambassador of Paulsland. I got to know these men as I helped them do business dealings with our country. Spices and such. Recently I heard about the trouble the Himyarites are having and thought it would be advantageous for your nobles to take advantage of the troubles and bring the city of Muza into the kingdom of Aksum.”

“So you’re why these men have been building a massive army in my kingdom?”

“Yes, sir, but if you look closely at the situation, you will find that I am also why they are building a massive navy as well, to transport that army across the Red Sea.”

Zoskales was confused for a moment and then pointed at a man and said, “Go send a messenger on the fastest horse and find out if this is true." Then he turned back to Udo and said, “Why are you, a foreign diplomat, raising an army in my country?”

“Why not? It's not uncommon to hire one nation's army, to fight another nation.” And then, avoiding mentioning the war in Paulsland, “The Himyarites have had a monopoly on frankincense and myrrh for generations. Paulsland is tired of competing with them for the perfume market, so now that they are distracted, it is the perfect time to hire your men to invade their nation. Your shores are less than half a day from their shores, whereas Paulsland is weeks away. Paulsland could not take advantage of the current turmoil, but your nation can, so we hire your men. It’s a simple business decision that will make lots of gold for everyone.”

“If it's such a simple business decision, where is my gold? You’re hiring my people. I demand payment in return.”

Udo feigned fear like he didn’t have the money to pay the king. He looked back at his partners, as if uncertain, then turned back to the king and hesitantly said, “Well, if you don’t want to partner with us, then I guess making a one-time payment to you upfront will save us money in the long run.”

“Payment now, and payment when you return with spoil…” Then the king looked confused for a moment and asked, “Partner? Partner? Why would I want to be a partner with this little war?”

“We are going to take Muza. If you were partnered with us, that would make Muza an Aksum city, which would mean it would need to have your soldiers garrisoned there, and your ships to patrol its harbors.”

“That’s an expense. I want gold.”

“It would also mean that you could charge a toll on any merchant ship entering the Red Sea. Just have your ships patrol between Aksum and Muza.”

The king did not say anything, but his face clearly showed that his first thought was, “I hadn’t thought of that.” The king considered Udo’s words for five seconds, ten seconds, then after thirteen seconds, he said, “I can spare a few thousand soldiers and a few ships.”

And that’s how Udo got the Aksum to fight for Paulsland at a significant discount. By the time Udo was done, fifty thousand men were preparing to cross the Red Sea to attack Muza next month, and the Paulsland navy would get to keep their brand new state-of-the-art ship, albeit it would ferry Aksum troops for the foreseeable future. The army wasn’t the best. The majority never even held a spear before and were poorly armored, but it would make the Himyarites forget all about Paulsland, and that’s what mattered.