It’s light in her hand. Weighted below the notch. Perfectly balanced, allegedly.
‘Red yew heartwood,’ says the clerk. ‘Bowstring is made of aged mountain drake heart fibre. Ruby bearings on the weights for frictionless movement. The limb is rated for two-hundred thousand shots before it needs re-tempering. Fifty pound draw weight, but that can be adjusted to taste.’
Garland raises his brows. ‘Impressive.’
‘It is,’ says Harla admiring the piece of art in her hand that also happens to function as a weapon. ‘But what makes it worth half a million orels? I can get a Hardshaw and Co. Bennesat recurve for under ten thousand that is just as impressive on the battlefield.’
Harla expects the clerk to snort in derision, or roll his eyes, but instead he smiles knowingly and says, ‘Value proposition. The bow’s maker, Rene du Mont, won’t sell a single bow for anything less than three-hundred thousand. If he did, all the du Mont bows would drop tremendously in value. If everyone is paying in the mid-bracket, all du Mont’s are expected to be valued in the mid-bracket. Value is what people say it is.’
‘The moment she buy this,’ says Garland. ‘It loses its value. Every shot she takes wears the bow out, and lowers the value. A re-tempering would ruin it. It’s a huge loss.’
‘Not so,’ says the clerk. ‘Not with mid-bracket. At this tier, bows not only maintain their value, they actually increase.’
‘Used bows are more valuable than new?’ says Garland. ‘I don’t see how.’
‘Exclusivity,’ says the clerk. ‘This particular bow, the Genesse Heartpicker, is made only in the hundreds. Each has a unique glyph ingrained in the back by du Mont himself. Once they’re all sold out by authorised dealers like myself, they’re value on the grey market will soar.’
‘But why?’ says Harla. ‘They’ll be used. Worn.’
‘A touch of legend goes a long way,’ says the clerk. ‘Each feat, each victory, and each adventure achieved with this bow in your hand raises your status, and that of the bow. It becomes more than a Genesse Heartpicker. It will be Harla the Hawk’s Genesse Heartpicker. And that’s good for all of us. The value of all Genesse Heartpickers will go up, as people scramble to buy the bow that Harla the Hawk used in all her conquests. That, and all the copies that will crop up.’
Harla looks at Garland, who raises his brows in a way that says “makes sense to me.”
‘Of course, you recognise the name Cadmire,’ says the clerk.
‘Bedman Kahnie’s bow,’ says Harla. Any bowmaster worth their salt knows about Bedman’s Cadmire.
The clerk points to an empty rack. ‘He bought a blue Cadmire from that rack there from my father eighty years ago. Cost him fifty-thousand orels. A perfectly mid-bracket bow, with mid-bracket specifications. Extremely functional. Not much style to is. Do you know what a blue Cadmire is worth now?’
Harla and Garland shake their heads.
‘Well, after your ten year wait on the Carmire lists, you can pick up one for a cool three point six million orels.’
Garland whistles.
The clerk smiles.
Harla the Hawk shrugs, and hands back the bow. ‘Box it up for me.’
Paddy Dobson
30th May 2022