Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 339 of 619

The title was posted on the wall. Ajax now had a name, a house, and a Code. But a house lived on what it could sell. The next morning he called Grayson, Tucker, and Aldric to the vault to face a plain question. Was the vault full enough to feed his men through the thaw, and what still needed building before the ships came? Aldric set his ledger on the stone bench and ran his finger down the columns. Grey showed in his hair. "Three hides. The large one whole, two cut for coats. Three vials of gland oil. The dryad's sap and leafcloth. Bone needles, six sets." He closed the book. "It sells fast. It does not last." Ajax looked at the shelves. Gold bars stacked deep, silver in rows, coin in sacks. Wealth he could not eat. "Coin fills the vault," he said. "Goods empty it. We have coin and nothing to trade." Tucker leaned on the doorframe, gold chains flat on his chest. "Four ships promised before the thaw," he said. "They come to buy. If we've got one hide and a fistful of needles, they don't come back." He let it sit. "A dock master talks. Empty shelves are a story too." Grayson stood by the door, silver chain on his bare chest, arms crossed. "Then we hunt," he said. "That's the answer." "Hunting's the past," Aldric said. He did not soften it. "Beasts run out. The hunt built our name. It won't hold a trade." Ajax set both hands on the bench. He knew Aldric was right. A vault full of gold meant nothing to a merchant who wanted cloth, boots, and cure. He needed a place that made goods every day, not a camp that killed a beast and waited. "We build the workhouse," Ajax said. He watched their faces. "A stone house by the loom. Tanning racks, drying frames, benches for Vello's bone work and Tarron's stitching. All in one place. Every man not on the wall makes goods." Aldric opened the ledger again and wrote. "That turns the vault from a hoard into a supply," he said. "Coin buys wool and hides. The house makes cloth and cure. Ships fill the shelves back." "Costs us the field by the pen," Grayson said. "I can spare four days of stone." "Take them," Ajax said. Tucker grinned. "I'll tell the ship masters what's coming," he said. "Let them dock hungry." Ajax gave the order that hour. Bran laid the first footing by dusk. The vault was not full, and its gold could not feed a single ship. But by building the workhouse, Ajax turned Black Oak from a raiding hoard into a house that made its own worth. He had a title now, and a place to earn it. What came next was filling the shelves before the first sail broke the water.