On one of those shortest of days, good cheer across the realm, she took in the expected guest that, like her, had nowhere better to be. The fire crackled, bathing the room in warm hues, his drink like liquid amber as he swirled it, hers with a geeam rising from it as she took a sip.

  “While the st year has been calmer than the year before, it certainly still felt busy,” the mayor said.

  She tittered behind her cup, then took a sip. “I shall refrain from hosting too many bazaars of such a scale.”

  He waved her off. “Pray do not think I am pining, simply making a ent.”

  Silence her reply, she sipped a little more before having a cracker. The spread on offer was nothing too extravagant; however, for her, that meant it was the quantity that had been reduced, not the quality.

  “My Lady… if I may bring up something we discussed at this time st year?” he asked, his voice quieter than she was used to.

  “Yes, everything is in motion. If I would die this moment, well, I am afraid Mr Mayor and Gianna should have to live through iing times,” she said.

  Although spoken as a joke, her the mayor nor her maid ughed. “Please, My Lady, do not speak so lightly of such matters,” he said.

  “It is precisely these matters which should be spoken lightly. For all I may ph is a most capricious friend, one whose arrival may never quite be predicted, but whose arrival will certainly e to pass for kings and beggars alike. However, I am a most thh pnner. Uhers who would not dare prehend their owh, I do, so it is that death will not be my end.”

  He listened closely, then took a long sip. “My Lady, I am not sure su answer reassures me.”

  “It should. Everything I do from this moment forward is superfluous. I have achieved that which I wished to achieve. However, I eet God until He calls for me, so I am afraid Mr Mayor and Gianna will have the pleasure of my pany for a while longer,” she said.

  This time, he did chuckle. “I hope to keep your pany for many years still.”

  She looked into her cup, a gentle smile lingering on her lips. “I would ask Mr Mayor to remember those words. These ing years, I shall be testing Mr Mayor.”

  “Then I shall endeavour to pass such tests,” he said, an unmistakeable pride to his voice.

  Thinking of that, she smiled. “Often is made mention of women’s fiess, yet I know of nothing as mercurial as a man’s pride,” she said.

  He ughed and then said, “I would give no obje to that.”

  Silence followed as the two drank and she sometimes snacked. A fortable silehe evening long and they only had so much versation to fill the empty hours.

  Still, he was a creature of versation, so verse he did. “My Lady, I would ask, not out of disagreement, is the situation iy truly as you desire?”

  She did not answer immediately, having another sip first and then handing her empty cup to her maid.

  “Each group has their pce. As we have discussed before, I have use of the Church for the delivery of charity to the people. The nobles bring structure. They will defer to me before siding with oners. As for the guilds, I only find issue with them as they are trying to hold monopolies on goods that I wish to produce more of. They otherwise do fine work training their members towards mastering their crafts.”

  Pausing there, she accepted her fresh cup of tea. After a sip, she carried on.

  “What matters more than their individual merits is that we may now begin to chip away at their respective authorities. That is, we take from one and give to another and keep a little for ourselves.”

  “To what end?” he asked, brow furrowed.

  She softly smiled. “Io what end? I suppose I would ideally have everything under our trol. What good others do, we may also provide. The others are useful as we may borrow their authority to assist with things we would like to do. However, as we gain authority, that bees more of a nuisahan an advantage.”

  Pausing there, she waved him off.

  “My apologies. I am rather speaking in circles,” she said. After a sip of tea, she tinued. “We currently ck authority, so we wish to use their authority to gradually shift authority to us, that we eventually have no need of sharing authority with them. Of course, I am using authority as a… euphemism. Powers, rights, responsibilities—these nebulous things that are half-intangible a more by iia than legal dotation.”

  “So then My Lady simply wishes to have plete trol?” he asked.

  She almost ughed. “The world is a vast and plex thing,” she said, giving her cup a gentle swirl. “I could perhaps manage my fief entirely if I so devoted myself. However, I would rather build institutions that exist to serve. The Church, the he guilds—they all exist to further themselves. Our society has thus been built around them. As such, there are limits and weako our society. At the simplest, I have mentiohe guilds and their monopolies, which limits rowth.”

  Silence followed but for their sips of their respective drinks. Eventually, his brow smoothed out. “I hate to sound g in imaginatio I ot see hoould repce them,” he said, his voice thick with reluce.

  “It is reasoo think that that which has yet to be done is impossible. However, it very much has been done,” she said, her light tone carrying the hint of a riddle.

  He fell into thought once more. “Is My Lady speaking of the bazaar?” he tentatively asked.

  “Indeed. Several of the ittees existed as… experiments, shall we say?” she said, pausing to chuckle. “The reason why so little money had been mispced is due to the efforts of one ittee which maintaihe ats, including following up when the ats did not line up. Another ittee maintained something of a sus, which recorded which businesses did what work for rojects.”

  “As marvellous as those might be, I still fail to see how they would be at all profitable,” he said.

  She agaihe urge to ugh. “Well, that is because we have o be profitable. Does Mr Mayor fet who I am? It is my right to collect taxes, as it is my right to spend them. However, I am not a frivolous person, so I would colled spend them in pursuit of prosperity.”

  Her sigh mingled with the steam from her cup.

  “sider the repairs to the southern road. It shall cost us quite the sum, which other lords may well wish to recoup by charging a toll. However, is the point of the road not t more trade to our city? A toll would run ter to that. So it must be that, if we are to do it, it is either because, in doing so, we will be able to grow the city suffitly to gather more taxes to cover the cost; or that doing nothing would shrink the city, redug taxes by a simir amount. Of course, the truth is a mix of both.”

  She took a sip.

  “However, it is also the case that colleg taxes to then spend means we are giving people employment, both as road-builders and the merts wh ierials. It is not suffit to simply think of the road itself.”

  After a sip, he chuckled and held up his gss. “My Lady has grahoughts than any I have met.”

  “To sider this grand, Mr Mayor has surely led a sheltered life,” she said.

  “Perhaps I have,” he said and gave another chuckle. “I found it stra first how My Lady seemed to fte her fief with the city; however, I now begin to see.”

  She waved him off. “It has always simply been that it is to my advantage,” she said.

  He smiled and said no more.

  “Such a topic… is this truly what Mr Mayor wishes to hear about for his present?” she asked.

  “My Lady’s thoughts do fasate me, regardless of the topic,” he said, his eyes pinched by his broad smile.

  A smile touched her lips that quickly hollowed, her gaze falling from him to her cup. “An iing topic, then, is that the Poles and Greeks have brokered a peace.”

  “Is that not a good thing? We have missed the steady shipments of food from the east,” he said.

  “I would say it is not a good thing that two of the Empire’s enemies now find themselves at pead with capable, experienced armies,” she said lightly.

  A wrinkle spoiled his brow. “The Poles I uand, but how is it that the Greeks would be our enemy?”

  “There has been a religious tensioween the Austrians and the Balkans for a while now. If the Greeks weigh in, one of the Balkans will force the matter. In such a case, we would have to support the Austrians.”

  “Really? I would think having a weakened neighbour to our advantage,” he said.

  Chug, she held out her cup. Her maid took it and, soon enough, brought it back, once more full and steaming.

  “What do the Swiss and the Austrians have in on? Their nd is rather defensible. Of course, the Empire could have easily quered them regardless. It is the case, though, that, being indepe, they are more ied in their army than they would otherwise be. The cost of their armies outweighs whatever taxes the King could leverage from them.

  “What it also means is that, if we defend their snty, then any enemy would have to cross their nds first. Aation falls to their people. Perhaps, they may be persuaded to ally against us one day; however, we have a… thh uanding of the terrain by now. As long as we act swiftly, the nd will still be defensible for us.”

  He nodded along at first, then fell into his drink, a wrinkle once more upon his brow. “My Lady is well versed in these matters.”

  “I did spend half my childhood expeg to one day bee queen,” she said lightly.

  His mouth thinned into an awkward smile. As if eager to avoid that topic, he attempted a thought of his own. “The Empire thehe eastern border for a simir reason? That is, the Bohemian Duchy is loosely lined by hills and mountains.”

  She gestured, tipping her hand. “The situation ihe Empire is a little more plicated. Bohemia is indeed highly defensible, which is why Bavaria is ruled by a Marquess. It may teically be a lower rank; however, there is the expectation of lesser dues such that a rger army may be maintaihe Duke of Bohemia tends to have a lot of ceremonial roles too, that he must spend much time in the capital.”

  “Not this year,” the mayor said.

  She gave a smile before having another sip. “We should temporarily expand the bombards to thirty,” she softly said.

  Silence followed for a long while. “My Lady wishes to bee involved in the war?” he asked.

  “That would depend which war Mr Mayor has in mind,” she said, pausing to chuckle. “I ot know everything, so I may only prepare for those eventualities which require our involvement. Pray be at ease, I do not io be wasteful, simply that there are iments worth making. I have said before that an unused army is a costly expense, so too is repg an army. It must be used with care and purpose and that is exactly what I have in mind.”

  The mayor listened, a chill dripping down his spine. He had been privy to the reports from when her army had st been used. However, he had never disagreed with either her methods or her results.

  He let out a long breath, then asked, “Does My Lady expect the Poles or the Greeks to be the oo break the peace?”

  “I ot say. It would be to our advantage if it is the Poles, that the Duke would be more ameo a ceasefire in that instance. However, if it is the Greeks, it would be an easy war that we would join simply to give our soldiers experience. I dare say the Empire would not even join so long as the Hungarians are wary of having Greek troops pilge their nd on their way to the war. To reach Wien from the south, it would be a miraculous achievement.”

  “Is that so? Now that I sider it, though, why would the Poles attack us?” he asked.

  She had a sip of her tea and watched the world through the steam. “That is a plicated question,” she said. “To begin with, King Sigismund is a capable ruler, despite his ued assion. It is clear that his upbringing has influenced his rule. His branch of the family dealt mostly with trade, so his goals are to that end.”

  Siletled for a moment as she collected her thoughts.

  “We look to his first quest, he wrested trol of Gdańsk from the Baltic trade league. From there, he pushed around the bay to Królewiec, seg Polish trol even as the people along the coast are very much German. While the Empire put pressure on him to returies’ independence, he sought an alliah Charles of Sweden and then ter his son Albert. This alliance was built upon bypassing Danish trol of access to the North Sea. I few decades, a lot of Polish goods gh Sweden to the Frend British.”

  She took a sip.

  “After that, he uandably had to react to the circumstances of the time. Once peace fell, though, he began to pressure south. It is clear to me that he hopes to join the Baltic Sea to the Bck Sea, if not take even stantinople aablish trade with Alexandria. Such a position would also give him a monopoly on grain ing from the east. In that case, he would have a rather strong position in aiations with his neighbours.”

  This time, she did not interrupt the silehat fell, which thus spurred him to ask the burning question: “Pray tell, what has that to do with Bohemia?”

  Her lips curled. “He knows his neighbours are not stupid,” she whispered. “If he did achieve his goals, then we would simply ally to crush him and it would be easy, so he o approach his goals in such a way to not allow that.

  “While I ot say for certain, as I see it, he would seek to take Bohemia in a swift war and then hold a defensive line along the border with Bavaria. By the time the Empire’s army arrives to drive him off, he theiates a deal where he withdraws with a guarantee of peace between our tries for a decade or so. Of course, he will have thhly pilged the nd by then, which would help to fund another war with the Greeks.”

  She had another sip.

  “I could see him making an accursed deal with the Turks, what better way to preserve his gains than to create a bigger threat for us to worry about. The Pope would surely rally us all if the Muslims dared set foot on Europe once more. In such a case, would the Muslims not rally too? By the time su affair is fihe ink on the nes would be long dry, the Polish borders well settled.”

  The mayor listeo it all, enthralled. “My Lady thinks highly of King Sigismund.”

  “Do I?” she said.

  His throat suddenly felt rather dry. “Do you not?” he asked.

  “The more important question, if he does follow this path, is whether or not he is even aware of my existence.”

  “If he is not?” the mayor asked.

  She smiled. “Then he soon shall be.”