The Free Cities of Varisia (Bel's Nations Game IC)

[Toptomcat]

The OOC thread

"What do you mean, the Tower of Records is on fire?"

Amelia Centinari, the Serene Doge of the Free Cities of Varisia as of six PM this Thursday, glared at the functionary from across her desk.

"Green fire, your Serenity. The smoke seems to be drifting down, not up, spreading through the streets: we've had to evacuate half the Administrative District. This has greatly complicated firefighting efforts."

The young elf massaged her temples for a moment, trying to fight off a rising headache.

"Dispel Magic's been tried, I hope?"

"It dissipates a good-sized chunk of the smoke, but more's always coming. Trying it on the flames hasn't been much better: we don't have enough mages to put it all out at once, and if you leave half of it burning the other half catches it alight again.

Unless someone comes up with a brilliant solution, we're going to have to let it burn to the ground."

Emily snarled in a distinctly unladylike fashion.

"Those motherless Medici bastards. I knew they wouldn't take losing the election well, but I wasn't expecting them to torch the place on their way out.

By the Golden Lady, I need a drink. Join me, Lorenzo?"

"Certainly, madam."

Amelia pours herself a shot of amaretto and immediately downs half the glass, savoring the taste of the sweet almond liqueur on its way down.

"Okay, then. Damage control. Tell the firefighters to get out of there- no sense losing half the force to smoke inhalation. Complete the evac of the Administrative District and start finding some temporary workplace for the ones we can't lose. I'll talk to Eria about getting some of the Academy professors to put out the fire, or demolish the Tower safely, or something.

And put a bounty on the Medicis. This crosses a line."

"At once, my lord Doge."

Emily slumps over her desk as the flunky leaves it, sighing a pained sigh. With seemingly no warning or summons, Eria abruptly teleported into the room.

"The fire?"

"Yep."

"We're already working on it. I told Lorenzo it was a loss."

"This sucks, Er. What with this and the assasinations, we're going to be governing in the dark. No records, no good maps...it'll be like Varisia just appeared here out of the blue. We're going to have to send out scouting parties to a land we've lived in for centuries. Reestablish diplomatic relations with everybody. It's humiliating."

Eria gave the older girl's hair a tousle.

"We'll make it work."

[Toptomcat]

Eria's head thuds onto the desk, causing the mounds of parchment packing every inch of it to wobble precariously.

"I am going to die. I am going to die of a lethal overdose of paperwork. They will line my coffin with copies of Cohort Leader Assignment Form #23b."

Emily bops her lightly with a wadded-up ball of paper.

"And then I'll raise you from the dead and stick you back at the desk, because we still aren't done. C'mon, suck it up and have another cup of cappuccino. It's all one-time business, anyway: it won't be like this every week. We just need to sort out the initial snarl."

Eria takes a deep breath to compose herself and picks her head off the desk.

"The initial snarl is stupid. I don't care how good our maps were before the fire- we should've had someone kitted out for exploration beforehand, it's ridiculous that we're just training up scouts and explorers now. And we have to rebuild an intelligence network from scratch? This is a fiasco. Gods damn the Medici."

"I'm working on that. In the meantime, drink your coffee and keep going through the pile until it's gone."

[Toptomcat]

Amelia Centinari stands on a hill overlooking the proving grounds. Laid out beneath her is a lavishly detailed illusionary obstacle course, and thousands of cavalry sweating their way through it. They're superb troops, but not used to the kind of rough-country bushwacking that their country needs from them now: she makes a note as Black Legion's fifth cohort falls behind schedule again.

"Hi."

Eria swoops down from the darkening sky.

"Hey, Eria. No explosions. I even heard there was some kind of party. Things must have gone well?"

"Umm. We kind of need to reform the tax system."

This earns her a Look.

"I must say, that isn't one of the top hundred things I was expecting to hear after I send you to deal with an incursion of thousands of bloodthirsty fae."

"See, the thing is, your divination was right. Ish. They weren't really looking for a fight. Best guess, they've bitten off quite as much as they can chew fighting their closer neighbors. But they were looking for tribute, and they seemed ready to start something if they didn't get it. They want five percent of tax receipts. Itoldthemyes."

"We haven't really got the room to raise taxes another five percent, Eria. The merchant princes are pissed-off as is."

"Yeah, I know. Here's the idea: we bring back the tradition of opera corrogata. Get a big chunk of our tax in labor rather than goods or currency. The fae can't get five percent of a streetsweeping, or a repaving, or whatever."

Emily thinks for a moment, then grins and sticks her tongue out at Eria.

"You're overthinking it. Why don't we just short them? Neither nomadic raiders nor fairies are exactly renowned as brilliant accountants."

Eria reddens, sputters for a moment, then looks away from Emily and pretends that her glasses urgently need cleaning for a bit.

"...wow, I feel dumb."

"Don't be ridiculous. You can melt a pretty good-sized mountain with just that brain of yours and a couple of words of gobbledygook. You're the Grand High Thaumaturge, remember? You just need a friend to double-check your brilliant ideas every now and then.

Good job getting those bloodthirsty maniacs off our backs for a bit."