‘And we shall have tables newly carved, a thousand in number, and bowls and plates and knives in silver, of twenty thousand sets, and there must be cloth enough to cover all, embroidered with the heraldry of the duchies and encased by my own colours, and if we have not the artisans within our walls we shall have them brought over the seas, and if they have not the tools then we shall have them forged here.’
Chancellor Mavin notes all this down on parchment, knowing she shall remember it all anyway but not trusting the king to recall what he asked for. He will not think to ask if they have the coin for this, nor if it can be done in time.
‘We shall have the credit of the guilds,’ says Mavin in a flat, factual tone, wanting neither to question the reach of the crown’s power, nor to allow the king to stretch their credit beyond what the kingdom can produce. Once the king has asked for a thing, then it must be so, or his authority becomes a question and not a fact.
The king is gazing out of the window, the sea breeze touching the bandages around his head. ‘Credit.’ He spits the word as if it is venom. ‘I have marched my armies to distant lands and conquered the peoples there. I have wielded magics unseen by the known world, toppled castles thought unbreachable, and reaped the rewards on the back of ten thousand wagons. I have cleared the sea lanes of pirates, opened the ports of enemy kingdoms, and brought in trade from a continent that most people have never heard of. Yet I must ask my subjects for their credit? How is this so, Mavin?’
It is a rhetorical question. Mavin knows the king understands the economy of his kingdom as well as she does, if not quite down to the granularity of the exact figures. But he doesn’t have to like it.
So in response Chancellor Mavin simply responds, ‘Ill times, sire.’
Paddy Dobson
16th May 2023