Before the Storm: Act 10, Chapter 7
Chapter 7
『Holy crap, that was annoying. Annoying and weird. Well, it wouldn’t have been annoying if it wasn’t so weird.』
Clara was rather annoyed as well, but she knew better than to join in on Liane’s tirade. The opening stages of their trade negotiations had not gone as expected, mainly because they ended up across the table from the wrong people.
She and her friends had gone into Rol’en’gorek expecting to deal with the local government, just as they had in the Draconic Kingdom. What happened instead, however, was that the local government had appointed the Merchant Guild to negotiate on its behalf.
It’s because we framed them as trade negotiations.
In hindsight, it was a careless move – one grounded in the norms of the society she was raised in. When a government pursued trade relations, it usually signalled a desire to grow closer to the subject in question. Apparently, Rol’en’gorek didn’t share the same interpretation. Trade relations meant trade, trade meant Merchants, and so Lady Xoc delegated the task to the Merchant Guild. Add to the fact that Master Leeds and his associates were from the Draconic Kingdom and thus far more familiar with the world outside of Rol’en’gorek and it made the Guildmaster a shoo-in for Clan Pa’chan’s principal negotiator.
Of course, the misunderstanding could be corrected, but the amount of influence that the Merchant Guild seemed to hold over Lady Xoc was something to be wary of. The accounting of the Guilds also gave them a better idea of the costs of doing business in Rol’en’gorek, so there was merit in keeping things as they were for the short term while they developed a better picture of the region.
“Let’s get back to the wharf,” Clara said. “Master Leeds said it won’t take long for him to bring down the extra dockworkers he needs.”
“Uh, how are we gonna do that, exactly?” Liane asked.