Chương 77: Chapter 74 – Disappearing Taverns

Arlic sat in front of a sheet of paper currently covered in various mathematical symbols. The symbol π came up frequently. The charcoal marks around it had been scratched out and rewritten so many times that the parchment had begun to roughen beneath his hand. Next to it lay another sheet containing a very bad drawing of a still, a squat copper pot with a narrow neck and a pipe that curved away at an angle that looked more hopeful than correct.

He tapped the charcoal against the table and leaned back slightly to compare the two sheets. The drawing did not improve under inspection. This was disappointing, as it had been drawn with considerable optimism. Seren was sitting nearby doing real paperwork. The ledger she used to track fermentation was open in front of her, columns of numbers moving steadily beneath her pen. Every so often she glanced up, not at the papers but at him.

Alric suspected she was ensuring he wasn't sneakily doing manual labor when no one was looking.

"I'm not lifting anything," he said without looking up.

"You say that," Seren replied calmly, turning a page.

"But last week you tried to carry two grain sacks yourself."

"They were right there."

"And so was Henry." She said without taking her gaze off the ledger, but Alric could tell she glaring at it, as if it too might lift something without permission. Alric made a small noise and returned to the sheet. He referenced the math page to the drawing again, frowning slightly as the curved pipe refused to behave in his head the way it did on the parchment. The numbers made sense individually, but every time he tried to combine them the proportions drifted somewhere strange, which was very rude of them.

A knock on the door caused them both to look up. Vale stood in the doorway holding a ledger, a sheaf of loose papers and an annoyed expression. The papers were folded and refolded, several still bearing their own seal and hurried signatures from tavern owners.

"A bunch of taverns have just… closed," he said, lifting the papers slightly. He stepped inside and dropped them onto the desk. The sheets were receipts for receiving casks of beer. Alric could see the rough signatures confirming delivery. They clearly had been signed.

"It's what?" Alric asked, leaning back in his chair.

"How many?"

"Twelve," Vale said. Alric blinked.

"Twelve?" he repeated. Vale nodded once.

"Doesn't make sense for this time of year." He separated several of the papers and tapped them with one finger.

"Also these four have ownership changes attached. New owners claiming they shouldn't have to pay for the previous owner's beer." He glanced toward the wall while he said it, the annoyed expression intensifying slightly. Alric studied the receipts. Each one represented a single cask, nothing unusual by itself. Taverns ordered constantly. Deliveries moved through the city every day, and most of them passed without comment, which was how commerce generally behaved.

"It's what, a silver?" Alric asked, tilting his head slightly.

"Don't sell them beer until it's paid."

"Well, yes," Vale said slowly, "but it's the cask I want." The angry look directed at the wall intensified. Alric had to hold back a giggle. Seren tried the same but failed, a quiet laugh escaping before she hid it behind her hand. Vale ignored both of them.

"They pay deposits on the cask though, are you sure this this not just normal?" Alric asked. Vale shook his head.

"Taverns close and open all the time," he said, "but not like this." Seren closed her ledger softly.

"We have also had a few former tavern staff coming looking for work," she said. Vale turned slightly toward her.

"They all seemed hesitant," she continued.

"Like they weren't sure if they had jobs or not."

"What do you mean?" Alric asked.

"One man said he was a cellarman," Seren said.

"Another worked the kitchen. A barmaid from the South Wharf came yesterday."

"And?" Alric asked.

"They asked about warehouse work," Seren said.

"Loading casks. Cleaning barrels. Anything temporary." Vale frowned slightly.

"They didn't say the taverns closed?" he asked. Seren shook her head.

"No. They spoke as if they were… waiting." Vale clicked his tongue and picked a new wall to glare at, as if it too failed to interrogate people looking for work. Alric was hard pressed to supress another giggle. Seren bit her lip.

"Waiting for what?" Alric asked breathing in deeply. Seren shrugged slightly.

"I'm not sure they knew," she explained. Alric leaned back again, folding his arms as he thought about it. If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

"Well," he said after a moment, "what causes taverns to close normally?" Vale considered the question.

"Debts," he said finally.

"Landlords raising rents. Creditors demanding payment. Sometimes a bad shipment of ale that nobody wants to drink." He shrugged.

"Usually there's shouting." Seren nodded slightly.

"A lot of shouting," Vale continued.

"Landlords banging on doors. Brewers arguing over unpaid barrels. Someone always trying to collect something." He gestured vaguely toward the city beyond the warehouse walls.

"But the carters didn't notice anything." No shouting. No creditors. Just receipts. Alric glanced down at the papers again. He just didn't see a pattern. Twelve taverns sounded like a lot when you said it out loud, but the city had hundreds. Taverns opened and closed constantly. A poor season, a bad landlord, him cutting supply, a thought that sat uncomfortably for a moment, any number of things could wipe one out overnight. They also lacked data to draw any meaningful conclusions.

"Taverns close all the time," Alric said with a shrug.

"Until we know more, not a lot we can do." Seren frowned slightly.

"It's too… orderly," she said. Vale nodded once.

"Unusual," she added. Alric looked between them.

"Well," he said, picking up one of the receipts again, "those under new ownership, refuse to sell them beer till we get the cask back or they square up with us." Vale nodded immediately.

"That's what I told the carters."

"Good," Alric said. The silver wasn't important. A single cask of beer disappearing now and then was just the cost of doing business. But the casks themselves mattered. The cooper could only produce them so fast and the brewery could not afford to lose them casually. Vale gathered the receipts again, straightening them slightly.

"I'll keep an eye on it," he said.

"Please do," Alric replied. Vale nodded once more, then turned and left the room, the door closing behind him with a soft wooden click. For a moment the office returned to quiet. Seren reopened her ledger, the steady scratch of her pen filling the room again. Alric looked down at the papers on his desk, the sheet of mathematical symbols, the crooked drawing of the still, the faint smudges of charcoal along the edge of the parchment. But his attention drifted slightly.

Outside the warehouse the muted sounds of the docks carried through the walls, carts rolling over stone, distant voices, the creak of rigging somewhere along the river. Something about the conversation lingered at the edge of his thoughts. Taverns closed all the time. But twelve in a row felt… strange. To Alric it felt as though something was moving beneath the surface of the city, slow and deliberate. But he couldn't tell what. Or in what direction. He finally had it.

Alric spread it out on the table in all its glory: a map of the city. Vale had to procure it and had apparently jumped through a few hoops to do so. Having a map of the city without permission was illegal, supposedly for defence purposes or something. Although it was clear the city's actual defences were concentrated on the noble quarter across the river, where walls, towers and gates watched the bridges far more carefully than they watched the docks, which were mostly defended by mud and easily bribed dockworkers.

Still, it was a map, and that meant information. The paper itself was thick and slightly yellowed, the ink lines precise and careful. Streets curved through districts like veins, the river cut across the city like a dark scar, and little clusters of marks indicated markets, guild halls and temples. Someone had clearly spent months walking the city to draw it, which suggested either admirable dedication or a lack of better hobbies. Alric loved it immediately.

They were going to copy it and begin mapping where their customers were. It wouldn't help much yet, but information was information. If they could see where taverns clustered, where shipments went, where deliveries were slow or unreliable, then maybe they could start thinking ahead instead of reacting to problems as they appeared. Vale and Seren were nearby, but neither of them shared Alric's enthusiasm. Vale looked as though he was still mildly irritated about the effort required to obtain the thing.

Seren, meanwhile, had taken one look at the map and returned to her fermentation ledger, clearly unconvinced that staring at streets would improve fermentation speeds, which they would in a deeply unwelcome way. Alric ignored them both. He was about to start making a copy of it when a knock came on the door. All three of them glanced up to see Henry standing there.

"Uh… Guard captain here to see you?" Henry said, looking slightly worriedly at Alric. Alric made a small eep sound and immediately began wrapping up the map. He looked across at Vale, who looked perplexed.

"Bring them in a minute, Henry," Seren said smoothly, smiling toward the doorway while Alric was unceremoniously folding the map and shoving it into a drawer. They all sat at their desks facing the door, attempting to adopt casual postures and failing miserably. A moment later the guard captain approached, having been led by Henry. He stopped briefly at the doorway and glanced inside before turning his head toward the two guards behind him.

He made a small gesture with his chin and they immediately stepped aside, taking positions outside the staff wing. Then the captain stepped inside. That's the same captain who questioned me after the fire, damn it. Did he give me his name?

"Uh… good afternoon, captain. Is there an issue?" Alric asked.

"Good afternoon? I ain't no nob," the captain said.

"No, I'm here to talk about beer." He glanced around the room briefly before moving toward one of the chairs. His armour clinked quietly as he sat down, resting one gauntleted hand on the table.

"My men are complaining," he said.

"They want the new beer they say, not the sour stuff. Summer is turning it all faster than a recruit on payday. My men open a cask and by the next watch it tastes like vinegar." Alric blinked once.

"I see," he said carefully.

"How much beer do you need?" The captain leaned back slightly in the chair, thinking.

"Let's see. I'd say about fourteen casks a week. But not as strong as you have it." He scratched his jaw thoughtfully.

"Miserable guards love to spread the misery around." Alric considered that for a moment.

"If we water it down, then we can't say it's always the same," he said slowly.

"My suggestion would be for your people to water it down?" They had stopped watering beer down at the brewery. Filtering and boiling water just to dilute a finished cask was nearly as much effort as making normal beer in the first place. Mana was their bottleneck after all, whether that was boiling water or wort didn't matter. The captain nodded after a moment.

"I see. We can do that then. It will need to come down to the old fort." Alric nodded.

"That's easy enough. The carters can reach there." He paused slightly.

"Do you want a contract?" The captain nodded.

"We'll issue you with one. Makes you a city supplier after all."

"I see," Alric said.

"In that case, is there something we can do for the carters?" The captain thought about this for a moment. Then he nodded.

"I suppose that makes them city infrastructure. We can issue them guard whistles. Patrols should respond like one of our own." Alric smiled and nodded. Then he realised something. This was the first protection he'd gotten without paying. Just aligned incentives.

"It's easier to guard something that works than something people fight over," the captain said as he stood up.

"I'll get some whistles sent over with the contract. Also a city clerk will need to talk to your clerk." Both him and Alric seemed pleased that the arrangement had worked out easier than expected. The captain left a moment later, his armour clinking faintly as he walked down the hall. It was only later that Alric realised his beer had crossed another line. It wasn't just commerce anymore. It was becoming public utility. Also… did the captain give him his name? How had he forgotten again?