"How much longer now, Jon?" Sam asked in a whining tone while trying to shift to a more comfortable position on his horse, but it seemed fruitless as he had already used every single part of his bum, and nothing was left unbruised.
He very much regretted their decision to take the kingsroad with horses instead of going the sea route through the white knife which would not only have been more comfortable but would have also taken them straight to White Harbor and be a lot faster.
"Not long now... We'll reach the city after we cross over that hill," Jon replied without taking his eyes off the book in his hands while pointing towards the hill in the distance. He had been reading that book since the start of their trip so Sam was already used to the scene of him riding his horse without looking at where they were going even though he was the one who was supposed to be leading and the one who knew the way.
The book in Jon's hand was a rare one with only a few copies in circulation around the world. It was called 'The Origins of the Iron Bank and Bravoos' and was written by Archmaester Matthar. He had borrowed it from the Citadel during his last trip there(though they probably had no idea that it was currently being borrowed).
This book not only detailed how one of the wealthiest banks in the world came to be but also shed some light on the interworking of the bank and how the Sealord and the bank's Secret Council controlled not only Bravoos but various other economies all over the known world, by lending their money to outsiders such as archons, tirachs, and the lords of Seven kingdoms.
While it was a very superficial book and didn't go into depth towards the real details, it was still a surprisingly good read if one wanted to get an idea of how the Bank operated.
According to the book, Iron Bank was founded by sixteen men and seven women who hid valuables in an abandoned iron mine shortly after the foundation of Bravoos.
As the mine's chambers filled with treasures, a bank was formed to utilize the wealth. Each of the twenty-three founders who had a key to these great subterranean vaults(previously the abandoned Iron mine), and their descendants—now numbering at least one thousand—are known as "keyholders". Among these Keyholders, who also have shares in the bank, the most powerful ones were elected to sit on the secret councils and have a voice in selecting who leads them.
"What is that?" Sam suddenly asked just as they crossed the hill— bringing Jon out of the book.
Jon looked up to see the only city in the North in all its beauty and magnificence. With houses built from whitewashed stone, and steeply pitched roofs of dark grey slate, it really looked quite pretty under the bright sun but that wasn't what Sam was pointing towards instead it was the long line of stables that had propped up outside the city that had gathered his curiosity.
"It seems they really used it, Huh..." Jon murmured to himself while looking at the novel spectacle in front of him.
He had sent a letter to Lord Manderly some months ago on a whim about the idea that the Citadel had come up with to reduce the population of horses inside the city but he didn't think that the Northern Lord would be so quick to apply it.
It was almost mid-day, the peak time for traffic to enter the city, but unlike the usual mixture of humans on foot and humans on animals, the main entrance of the city was mostly filled with traffic on foot as most of the people were choosing to leave their horses outside the city in the care of stables.
"Why are there so many stables outside the city?" Sam asked again when he didn't immediately get an answer, "And why are the people leaving their horses here instead of taking them inside?"
"I think... I think it's because the city is trying a new system," Jon said in an admiring voice— impressed with Lord Manderly's quick-wittedness, "It's a system where anyone who wants to enter on the back of a horse needs to pay an additional tax,"
"But Why? What could they possibly achieve by doing this?" Sam asked in a bewildered tone. He knew that a rich house like the Manderly's wouldn't go to so much trouble for this little amount of money.
"Mostly because of the shit," Jon said with a shrug.
King's Landing was not the only city in this world which had the shit problem— in fact, almost every single big city in this world had that problem. While the capital was unique in the sense that it had more human shit than animal ones, the rest of the cities still struggled with the shit of animals running like water through the streets no matter how many times they clean it.
And while the smell didn't propagate much here in White Harbor due to the cold, it was still quite a huge problem since animals were the only mode of transport in this world.
On average a horse would produce about 15 to 35 pounds of manure per day, so anyone can imagine the sheer scale of the problem. The manure on the streets also presented huge attractions to flies who would then go on to propagate diseases like typhoid fever.
His previous world also grappled with this problem during the 18th century. People at that time called it the 'Great Horse Manure Crisis of 1894' and the newspaper at that time predicted... "In 50 years, every street in London will be buried under nine feet of manure.". Of course, nothing like that happened and the situation was resolved because of motor vehicles... but until something like that happened in this world this was the best solution to this problem.
"But won't the people be unhappy with it?" Sam asked in a confused tone, because as far as he knew there was nothing the smallfolks dreaded more than taxes.
"Not at all. After all, it's not a mandatory tax," Jon said with a shrug as they slowly approached the city, "If they don't want to pay the tax then they can easily use those free-of-cost stables outside the city provided by the House Manderly. So in a way, they are saving money since now they wouldn't have to pay the innkeepers in the city to take care of their horses."
"So only the wealthy people will actually be affected by it." Sam said while nodding with an understanding expression, "Well, that is...Unless you're someone who needs to be somewhere very urgent, then you would have no choice but to pay the tax..."
"Hmm... for now at least," Jon said with a pondering expression.
"Huh? What do you mean?"
"Tell me, What do you think about a Starkhorse Carriage that is available for people to rent so that they travel inside the city at a fair price..."
"Starkhorse Carriage? What is that?"
"You know about the regular ones, right?" Jon asked and after Sam nodded he continued, "Well, just add another wheel on the rear side and a sitting platform on top of it. It would be a carriage that could easily carry two people all over the city for cheap and could be manually cycled by a single person," he said thinking about the tuk-tuk carriages that were quite famous in the Asian countries in his previous life.
"Jon! JON! HERE!"
They were just about to join the long line to enter the city when they heard the shouts of someone calling Jon. Both of them looked over to an almost empty side entrance, in front of which stood a middle-aged man, waving and beckoning them over.
"Let's go!" Jon said to Sam with a smile and both of them rode towards the familiar Merchant, whom Jon hadn't seen for a long time.
"Uncle Sam, How have you been?" Jon asked with a huge grin as he dismounted from Peggy and hugged the man who was almost as tall as him.
"I've been more than fine, Jon," the Merchant replied while warmly patting Jon's shoulder.
"Ah! Sam meet Uncle Sam. He is Becca's father and the one in charge of all our ships on the East side," Jon said while introducing the merchant, "And this is a good friend that I picked up during my Adventures in the Reach, and coincidently he is also Sam."
"Good Day, little Sam," the Merchant nodded and shook the shy boy's hand in greeting before saying, "I am sure we'll have plenty of time to get to know each other in the future but at the moment we need to hurry along..." he said while leading them towards the small entrance.
"Why?" Jon asked as they passed through the door where the guards seemed to be familiar with the Merchant and let them in after a cursory glance at them.
"It's Lord Manderly..." Big Sam explained with a sigh while leading them briskly through the crowded streets filled with people from all over the North, "I accidentally let it slip that you were expected to arrive before noon and he immediately insisted on throwing a small feast for you."
"Ah! That man is too fond of his feasts," Jon said while shaking his head with a rueful smile.
Big Sam took a discreet look behind him to see that little Sam had fallen back while leading the horses and was out of their earshot before turning back and asking Jon in a low voice, "So what did you decide Jon?"
"Huh? What do you mean?"
"Lord Manderly was too happy and excited for this to be just a social visit. A huge amount of money and profits have to be involved for a man of his stature to even quirk his lips," The merchant looked at Jon with undisguised curiosity in his eyes and asked, "So tell me, What did you decide to do with our Bravossi problem and why exactly is the lord so giddy to meet you?"
"Ah! You found out about that huh..." Jon said with a sheepish expression, "But nothing's done yet so I don't want to—" he stopped mid-way through the excuses with a wry smile when he saw the impatient inquisitiveness in big Sam's eyes, "Ah! Fine! If you must know then—I am... planning to sell it all."
"Huh? What do you mean sell it all?"
"It is exactly what it sounds like. I am going to give all rights to sell the Starkhorses on the East side of Westeros to Lord Manderly..." Jon explained with a shrug, "For a price, of course. He can then sell as many of them as he wants to any city he can access, we'll no longer have anything to do with it."
From the very beginning, Jon had only started this to get some seed money and now that he had more than enough of that, he didn't have to constrict the sales anymore so that he was the only seller.
Unlike the West Coast where the North had no sea trade with the rest of Westeros, there was already an established house here with trade routes to all cities. The Manderlys weren't known as the richest in the North for nothing, they had many connections, merchants, shops etc in every small and big city on this side.
Lord Manderly was known as someone who had his finger in many different pies, so Jon knew that making use of his connections was essential to boost this business beyond its current limits.
Plus it had the added benefit of placing the Manderly's as somewhat of a buffer between Jon and those two shadows in Kings Landing.
Jon didn't want anything to do with those two until he was sure that he would be able to deal with them. In addition, while he knew that the world was better off with the likes of Petyr Baelish dead, he wasn't too sure if Varys was an enemy or not at the moment.
And it wasn't like it was easy to get rid of them sneakily—No, in fact, both of them were among the top ten hardest people to kill in this Westeros, right along with the likes of, Tywin Lannister, Olenna Tyrell, Lord Bolton etc. After all, they lived right next to their worst enemies every single— they would already be dead if they weren't constantly vigilant with threats to their lives.
Poison—the most obvious solution that comes to anyone's mind when thinking about assassinating someone—was completely useless against them.
They never ate anything that wasn't exclusively prepared by their own man, they almost always kept guards by their sides, and they had the weaknesses of every single person under their employ firmly in their grasp so that no one could even think of betraying them.
And even if Jon was lucky enough and managed to kill one of them— they would immediately realise that there was a new player in the game and it would spook the one left fiercely. And god forbid if one of them managed to escape somehow and went into hiding, it would be all over. Because even Jon with all his wargs at his disposal would find it incredibly hard to find someone like them with all their resources if they were adamant about hiding.
So it was better for them to be in the open and for him to be in the shadows until it was time.
"B-But that's just—" Merchant Sam's bewildered voice brought Jon back to the present, "Why would you willingly give up such a money-making business? And w-what about all of our investments and all the ships that we bought and all the sailors that we've recruited until now—Are we just going to let them go? Just like that—"
"Calm down!" Jon firmly told the hyperventilating Merchant, "No one's going anywhere, and while it may seem like it, this is not a spur-of-the-moment decision. In fact, it was always going to end this way... All the things we've been doing until now have been just to prepare for this moment—for bigger things,"
"Bigger things?"
"Yes, Much bigger things!" Jon said with a gleam of excitement in his eyes, "After all, that is why our next destination is Bravoos..."
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