Mid 269 Spring
As the captured and newly named Sea Bear left the mouth of the natural harbor at the head of a three vessel fleet I felt a great weight slip off my shoulders, for the risk and responsibility of kicking off my trading ventures felt so light in comparison to the constant whinging of being at home these days.
The whinging began when I wrote a letter to Winterfell swearing my fealty rather than drop everything to make the trip, and this set Maege off as she wanted me on my knees as I verbally fellated Rickard Stark. I disagreed. Unlike all the Lords of Bear Island before me, I have better things to do that suck off every Stark I can find. Of course I explained it differently with talks of the sudden transition, ensuring security, what not and what for.
In truth, I loathed the Starks. I respected their capacity to maintain eight thousand years as the top dogs in the North, such dynastic stability is incredible. How much of that is the abilities displayed by the Starks and how much of it is the people of Westeros just being built differently I don't know, but this is the generation of Starks that break the streak. The generation led by Brandon Stark is unsurvivably dumb. The Darwin Award goes to them, and it extends to those who follow them directly.
They are an infection of stupidity.
So I sent a letter. Safer that way. More convenient too. Impertinent? Absolutely, but I don't have to contend with the Starks for long. They will take care of themselves quite ably and I'll be left with the Quiet Wolf as a liege Lord. Someone notoriously easy to manipulate.
Whether Maege saw through my bullshit or just is so eager to swallow Stark stiffy, the whinging began. I combated it through domestic abuse in the training yard. Unlike my father who just grinned and bared it, I took to beating Maege's ass like she did to me as I grew up. It bought me up to a week at time while she recovered from her bruises and scrapes, and was time well spent as the number of reasons for her to whing multiplied.
I opened the strategic food reserves of the keep to pay men to help me build the dock expansion and dry docks. While I only expanded the docks to accommodate my three ships, I built five dry docks. They were simple tasks, but hinted at shipbuilding in the future, and that grated against the utlra-conservative traditions of my family who had never believed they could live a better life having never seen one themselves as even our overlords lived sparse and uncomfortable in there megafortress of a home, a life largely built off access to local natural resources.
Fortunately Maege found no supporters in her objections to this as I had garnered a positive reputation for forward thinking. My consistency and success in developing myself translated to hope. Never underestimate the power of hope. It opens people up to change, and that is where both great leaders and great conmen make their money.
Maege did find supporters when the four and a half foot carved ironwood shaft and bear totem pommel arrived from the Forresters - a lesser noble family sworn to my Glover relatives - with my new ironwood shield . After releasing the blade from its former housing I fixed it and its new crossguard to the shaft and set off the whinging as I adapted to the new weapon. It didn't end until I faced the next top four warriors on the island in the training yard and they realized that with the added reach and the whippy maneuverability of the ultralight Valyrian steel blade on a stick they had no capacity to assail me, or even get passed my point control as I essentially herded the warriors with just my footwork and the tip of my sword spear, not to mention the way the steel cleaving capacity of the blade leapt up with so much extra leverage behind my swings.
As such it felt like a dream come true to sail away as my family receded into the distance with three captured longships filled with timber, and the pelts and jars of bear grease I allotted for this trip on the Sea Bear. That relief was something most of my crew didn't feel as young unwed men made up the majority. Young dreamers who want to believe that I know what I'm doing.
"Alright, men." I address the crew of oarsmen adding to the speed granted by our sails, "To Lannisport, and all that Lannister gold! Our gold!"
"Our gold!" they excitedly yelled back.
We quickly passed Sea Dragon Point as our first major landmark of our journey, hooking around the wasteland of a peninsula to begin our route south along the Stoney Shore and the Rills. Our passage through these lands was swift. Robert Baratheon covered the 1500 miles between Winterfell and King's Landing in fifty days, covering thirty miles a day. We covered that distance every other hour, even laden with timber. We'd make Lannisport within ten days.
We followed the coast of the Rill's down the large finger of land governed by the Flints of Flint's Finger, bypassing the town as they had as little as we did, and thus nothing of any possible interest. They also possessed a far worse reputation than House Mormont, having produced the worst Lord Commander of the Night's Watch in history in the form of Rodrick Flint who attempted to become King-Beyond-the-Wall.
We instead followed the coast south closely to the Cape of Eagles, eyes peeled as we grew closer and closer to the Iron Islands. The anxiety about the Ironborn grew and grew until we rounded the cape and made route to Seaguard where the Booming Tower Bell remained silent at our approach.
Despite the years of peace, the people on the docks that afternoon looked quite worried until they realized it was Northmen crewing the ships and not Ironborn. After that there was a great amount of back slapping and laughter as my sailors proudly retold the tail of the Battle of the Pink Harbor and their small parts in it.
While my men enjoyed their fifteen minutes of fame I spent the afternoon and evening looking for trade rumors so I wouldn't be caught flat footed by the merchants of Lannisport. The men I spoke to were more surprised that I was a Northman interested in trade more than I was a nobleman, as they suffered poor relations with the western coast of the North. It was a mix of disdain for southerners and the fact that the majority of the traders only made the trip during the fall to offload their food stock at the highest possible prices the desperate people could afford. As such trade in Spring and Summer is only conducted by the rare few that preferred less profit and surlier customers.
I got acceptable offers on my goods, and traded six excellent quality bear pelts for eight hundred Stags (Of which I would loose forty though the local tariff and eighty for the King's tax on interkingdom trade), but did not get what I wanted for the grease or lumber and kept half my pelts for the trip further South. We slept on the ships and departed before we could get hit with a second day of docking fees. We embarked on the most frightening stretch of our journey as we moved along Ironman's Bay.
Even my notoriously heavy nuts climbed up into my throat as we sailed by longships within sight of the Ten Towers and then Pyke while the black bear on green woods flags hung from ours. It was the sight of those very fortresses that kept the Ironborn on their courses, for none would attack us while under the gaze of the man currently sitting on the Seastone Chair, nor the gaze of his good-brother, Rodrick Harlaw.
Still doesn't change that deep seated dread similar to what you feel when the cops roll by.
We kept our guard up in case of pursuers even after we turned south again and left the Banefort behind, but as we passed the Crag and came within sight of Fair Isle, sharing the sea with more and more ships not of Ironborn design, my balls slowly descended back into their rightful place in my scrotum.
Our journey concluded after we rounded Kayce and the Feastfires leaving us with just a straight shot to Lannisport, and hopefully both profit and solutions for my strategic needs.
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More of a geography chapter than a maritime one. Unfortunately I do not know much about sailing as I am a giant desert rat. I'll try to look into the topic if sailing gives the audience stiffies, so speak now if you really want this story to focus on the maritime activity, otherwise just getting the geography correct will be it for the most part.
We'll be establishing the norms for the Lannisport Trade Route in the next chapter. I have possibly three chapters worth of content about his major routes, gaining suppliers, and expanding his fleet. Maybe more. I don't know how interested you will all be in my attempt to simulate Westeros Economics, but TLDR is that Jorah doesn't get a press trade to win button either. It's going to be a slow grind to get to the level where the Manderly's might slap him on the back and tell him he has a bright future.
Let me know what you think of that or if you want to get to the more visceral content quicker.
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