Of the City of Daub, and the Manner of Its Governance

Your Grace will forgive me for what I am about to write of Daub. I do this not because I know better than you, but because I believe you should know what Daub looks from the outside.

When I first came to Daub, what I beheld was less a city (as I am used to) and more some strange lawless wilderness that should not have lasted a fortnight. Perhaps lawless is the wrong word; perhaps the problem is that there were too many laws, enforced by too many different people, and both people and law changed often, sometimes from month to month, sometimes from street to street. There were Charter Knights at the gate who would make a token attempt to stop mugging and murder - but only if it happened near their posts, barracks or daily routes. There was the Haugris Church, but for every priest I counted ten guards; often acolytes with sticks, but sometimes more.

There more I learned about the city the more confused I became. The inn I first stayed at, and its surroundings, were said to ‘belong’ to Charlie Two-Fingers. Who was Charlie Two-Fingers? I had no-idea, but the innkeep assured me that I was lucky not to know. There was Doris the Delightful, who apparently ran or owned or collected protection money from half the bakeries in the city. This green field, surrounded by expensive cottages? All held by various Pendragons or the poorer cousins of Wattle nobility: Haaslings, Caravels, Epponion, Bautista. There were Umber Knives, Pacino’s Peacekeepers, the Paladins, the Playing Cards - all presumably reporting to Your Grace - but to an outside the only thing these people all had in common was that anything they did not like in their territory would get one beaten, robbed or outright murdered. Crossing the city from one end another meant walking through a patchwork quilt of jurisdictions, a mosaic carved out by two-bit gangsters and nobles.

It was common practice for a family with multiple grown children to send one to train with Charter Knights, the other to some merchant house, the other to be a ganster’s lackey, and the other to look like a stuffed frog in some noble’s pay - that was the only way to know which way the winds of Fortune would blow tomorrow. The only people nobody seemed to bother were the bankers and the Merchant’s Guild, probably because they were ones handling payroll. There are courts, but who answers their summons? Only nobles whose houses prefer to lose face or show off some expensive rhetoric than shell out the gold for another turf war. The Lesser Theoretical University had its own guards (mercenaries) and half the staff were old Singhapura war mages prowling for anyone stupid enough to break in.

I do not criticize Your Grace for this approach; no doubt it worked. But let me tell you what Singhapura sees:

Daub sits next to the river Sut. The old ruins of Himakatupura provided some ground; every subsequent generation added to what the previous one began. Its position and its resources have turned this into one of the fastest-growing cities in the Empire. There is an supply of labor, ever drawn from the youth of the provinces, who come to the city to make their fortune. There is iron, tin, lead, coal, lumber, wool, grain, cattle, coffee, tea. There is the Waste, which provides the Merchants Guild with rare magical vessels and Relics.

And this whole thing is protected by outer walls that a confused flock of sheep could leap over and is run by, depending on who you ask, a motley assembly of two-bit crooks, aristrocrats, wheelers, dealers, assasins and prostitutes. It is common knowledge in the Empire that Daub is kept the way it is because of the profitability of have a place where the Empire can conduct its more unsavory business - especially with other powers of the world - and because Daub can always be conquered in a weekend if the Adhiraj was bored enough.

Of the Lay of the Land

Your Grace knows every road in Daub better than I do, so I will be brief, and set down only how the maps at Taprobane see it. The clerks there draw Daub as a region rather than a city: the river Sut, the towns along it, and a great deal of hill.

Sevenrivers sits where the seven streams come together to make the Sut, and it is where the caravans gather. Howellcastle is downriver of it. Local tradition holds that the castle kept moving to avoid taxes until it settled here and grew fields; I have not been able to confirm this, but I note that its rates are still low. Deer Crossing is where the deer cross the river, and, as the innkeeper there explained to me at some length, presumably things that are not deer can cross as well.

Redhills is almost a city, and very fertile. Jerem the Red’s daughter runs it now, and runs it well; she has discovered that southern tourists will pay a great deal for an Authentic Northern Village, and has arranged to sell them one. Tombulgorod is the coffee estate, its town and its castle, and looks the way a Rosantic novelist imagines a castle should. Siraton is the prison-labour town, and Briar Glen, all cottages and meadows, is its much nicer neighbour; I suspect the one exists so that the other may.

Catherine’s Gate and Wulfstanding are the old forts on the eastern approaches, older than Wattle. I have never learned why the second is so named, though presumably Wulf disliked sitting down. Ember is a bandit village, which everyone knows and nobody does anything about. Suttleditch is Your Grace’s new port, of which I will say only that the Merchants are watching it more closely than they pretend.

Past the hills the land goes flat and stays flat, marmots and vultures and grass, all the way to the shore across which the Obsidian Empire is said to lie. I know little of what lies that way.

Of the Balance of Powers Within Daub

The key to long-lasting power is stability. The key to stability is a unified set of consequences for actions - what we call rule of law - and institutions. Drawing from my studies of power, allow me to bring the lamplight closer to the structures that I think most likely to prevail in the long-term, even if their commanding personnel were to dissapear:

1) The Charter Knights. Singhapura developed the Charter Knights because old soldiers, whose glory days are behind them, can still be of some use - and because, robbed of purpose, they tend to get up to mischief. There will always be Charter Knights; as long as there are violent people who are content to make a simpler living, there will be plenty of people happy to put on some armour, run a few patrols, and apprehend a troublemaker or two.

The Charter Knights give Your Grace direct enforcement and act as the most authoritative arm of your justice. The question is what they are supposed to do other than guard the gates. Given the nature of Your Grace’s conquest of Daub, it is natural that you do not fully trust the Charter Knights.

But this is a blade that must either be reforged or disbanded altogether. Daub’s Charter Knights, Your Grace, need some purpose; currently they are little more than people paid from your own coffers to stand around and do nothing while Daub falls to a million small sins. I say nothing of Your Grace’s own loyal men, but it is worth bearing in mind that resentment, envy, and complaint may arise in any body.

2) The Merchants. The Merchants Guild of Daub is the most interesting power in the city. Insofar as I can discern they are rather similar to the Singhapura Merchants Guild. However, though they are mentioned in no bylaw, act or proclamation, their underwriters sit inside every significant transaction; their guards police their warehouses and assets; their suppliers and wagon trains pass through every district. Political advisors who have treated them as a footnote have been removed. Furthermore, because they extract Relics from the Waste and sell to Singhapura, they are entrenched in place.

This power is thus both structurally indispensable and a threat to your position. I do not advise Your Grace to destroy this arrangement; it cannot be done without destroying the city’s commercial vitality; but nor should the Guild be allowed to mistake accommodation for dependence. Your Grace must find a purpose for them subordinate to your interests, or else you fall into the position of a tenant ruling over a landlord. Given that the Merchants possibly have more arms at their command than all others in Daub, it falls to Your Grace to find some mutually profitable endeavour that incentivize them to make sure Your Grace remains in power.

3) The Lesser Theoretical University of Daub. As the only serious rival (and reasonably competent ally) to the Taprobane Imperial University, they are the only people in the city capable of certain classes of problem-solving. Access to them is a form of leverage.

Presently they sit apart and outside the doings of the city at large, serving individually whoever will pay them enough. I would advise Your Grace to make use of them and to cultivate this relationship; it is otherwise the equivalent of leaving the armory unlocked for anyone to wander in and out at will. There reason I have spent many pages writing and rewriting my descriptions of magic is to help Your Grace understand how powerful LTU can be (on your side) and how utterly inconvenient it would be for anyone else to face them

Furthermore, there is an important economic opportunity here. Singhapura thrives not just because its war mages can lob fireballs, but because a significant amount of its magic is used for infrastructure. Roads, construction, farming - these are what make a city prosperous. Raising the quality of life for the everyday soul is what will ultimately allow Daub to stand under its own power and as a testament to Your Grace’s approach to governance. The LTU was specifically built for this, though of course they have retreated from this path. I would advise Your Grace to make it both economically and socially profitable for them to return to their original mission.

4) The nobility. Your Grace seems to have actively rescinded the power of such aristocrats as previously existed and replaced them with your own men. However, in this, Your Grace is simply perpetuating an institution. A noble is nothing more than a legitimate thug in fine clothing.

The classical use for the nobility is to serve as a highly trained, highly competent force of elite warriors and administrators. This requires cultivating them as Singhapura did - by allowing them great social power as long as they stick to actions and philosophies that benefit the whole, rather than just themselves, and the make sure that any missteps are vicious culled by themselves. What Your Grace now has are a series of small feuding warlords who are terrorizing the local bakeries out of boredom. Charlie Two-Fingers may answer to Your Grace right now, but unless Your Grace repeatedly and publicly places all these elements beneath your power, it will only take a generation or two before a their descendants begin vying for power themselves.

The Singhapura method of maintaining control is for the state to maintain overwhelming authority and force. Governance is based on a monopoly on violence. Your Grace’s methods, insofar as I can understand, is to counterbalance parties capable of violence against one another. The general battle of faith between the Haugris Church and the Temple of Eighteen is an example, as is Your Grace’s support of the Paladins as an alternative to a potential Church monopoly on heavy enforcement. I will not criticize this arrangement - after all, the Lusians use it - but I will note that having many small groups, each with their own definition of lawful authority, takes a toll on those leading everyday lives. In the least, these groups should be unified on certain fundamental principles and in their support of Your Grace, even if they are at odds with one another.

Your Grace should also perhaps carefully examine which of these bodies would act first in a crisis, and portion tasks and oversight accordingly. Redudant capacity is a source of strength but not when mismanaged.

Then there are those outside the city itself that still come under Your Grace’s authority. Jerem of the Redhills, once known as Bloody Jerem or Jerem the Red; Carfax and Rouster to the north; Wyrmstead and Vacourt to the east, not to mention minor vassals such as the Ashwoods the Pondrawaters. I should point out here that while they answer to you, their legitimacy, and thus their rule, comes from King Allant of Wattle. In this the map resembles not so much Daub and its vassal states than Daub being surrounded on all sides by people who would be happy to displace Your Grace if King Allant were to give the order.

The providence of this situation is that Wattle is still distant, and it is up to Your Grace to tie these vassals to you in such a way that maintaining the status quo is more profitable for them than removing your head.

In this Your Grace already has powerful allies. First are Your Grace’s own men and administrators. The second are the Tombulov estates, which hold a monopoly on the production of coffee. Their estates are well-defended; their product and their means to distribute it have spread far and wide across the land, from remote villages unto Singhapura itself; and they are, above all else, independent. They are perhaps the finest example I have encountered of Daub the fruits of the Empire — roads, networks for messaging, law and accoutrements — to build a new network of power. I urge Your Grace to re-examine carefully these operations and to learn from them. Additionally, the vast number of coffeehouses spread across the land may serve Your Grace as a powerful means of moving messages to and fro, if possible.

And the third are the Paladins, who Your Grace can empower as a legitimate force that can be relied on to solve those problems that are best met with a mailed fist to the face.

On the Nature of States

Weerasingha said every state comes down to one of three forms: rule by one, rule by a few, or rule by many. Molligoda, who wrote badly, added some distinctions of his own, and between them they are the basis of most political talk in Singhapura. It is no longer the latest thinking, but it is a handy frame to hang things on.

I have promised to spare Your Grace from the agony of reading Molligoda. Cows wandering over rice fields have written better sentences by accident in the mud; in a just world, Molligoda would have been hung, drawn, quartered, beaten thoroughly and then kept on bread and water for six weeks. Since we exist in an unjust world, it falls to me to sum his thoughts into a readable form.

Of the Sources of Legitimate Authority

The first thing to ask about any state is why its rulers are allowed to rule. Molligoda gives seven possible answers.

1) Divine right. The ruler’s authority comes from a god, or from a god’s blood, words or deeds. It isn’t of this world, and you can’t challenge it without first challenging the god. A state like this is as strong as its god is willing to get involved.

2) Aristocracy. Authority belongs to a class and passes down by birth. The ruler rules because of who she is, not what she has done. Such classes usually help themselves to whatever tools let them hand their power on to their children.

3) Election. The ruler has been voted in, and her authority only goes as far as the voters are willing to put up with. The state is strong as long as most of the votes go her way.

4) Plutocracy. Money is the claim. Whoever has enough of it has authority as a matter of course, and challenging them counts as an attack on property. It looks a lot like aristocracy, but it is less steady, because fortunes are made and lost, so people move up and down its ranks much faster.

5) The militaric. Authority comes from the ability to do violence, either personally or by command. Everyone understands this kind of power, and it is the least stable of all, because somewhere there is always someone stronger. Those who live by the sword die by it, as they say. Still, nearly every revolution has soldiers in it somewhere, and I know of no state that forgot about its own capacity for violence and came through unharmed.

6) The systemic. A structure produces the rulers, whether a religion, a bureaucracy or an examination. The power sits in the structure and not the person. When a prominent figure dies, nobody much minds, as long as the system can turn out another.

7) Merit. Authority is given for great deeds, or for passing tests the governed have agreed will count. Most new movements start here. It is also the most fragile, because merit is a matter of opinion, and whoever handed it out can always find a reason to take it back.

Most states claim one of these and actually run on another. It is a clever trick: for example, Singhapura claims divine right, but its actual strength are in its systems. The Adhiraj is extraordinarily powerful, but he can (and once was) replaced by a monkey and the show will go on, even if some of the workings stutter.

Of the Scope of Power

The second question is how much power the rulers really have. There are three sorts, and most states lean on one of them more than the others.

1) Absolute power has no legal or constitutional limit. The ruler does what she likes, and the only things stopping her are practical ones, such as money and other people’s willingness. Past a certain size, though, no ruler can decide everything herself without drowning in detail. She has to hand work to others, and whenever she does, a little of her power goes with it.

2) Legal power is granted and limited by law. The ruler works inside rules that everyone has agreed to be bound by. This is the safest kind for a ruler, because everyone is bound the same way. It takes constant work to keep a legal system respected and working, though. Once the laws are being dodged and mocked, the rulers who made them get dodged and mocked too.

3) Communal power is granted and limited by the community itself, by agreement and consent. It listens to the governed better than the others. It is also the hardest to use firmly. Leaders are chosen for a reason, and the ordinary man doesn’t have the knowledge to understand how the machinery of power works.

States lie about this too, Your Grace. A state that calls itself absolute but has no army to back it up is a legal state at best. A state that calls itself legal but settles every argument with soldiers is a militaric state in paper clothes. Singhapura is the best example I know. On paper the Adhiraj has absolute power. In fact almost everything, from the daily running of the Empire to decisions in war, needs the say-so of many parties, and a great many rivalries have to be kept in hand.

Of the Organization of States

The third question is how the state’s powers are arranged.

1) A unitary state keeps authority at the centre and hands it downward. One body of law and one kind of order covers the whole country, and local powers exist only as long as the centre allows. Such a state has to be run carefully. Everything depends on the centre, so when the centre fails, the whole thing goes down fast.

2) A federal state splits authority between regional governments and a central one, with their jobs formally separated but one shared framework of law over all of them. It holds up well as long as the regions get along. The trouble is that nobody ever agrees exactly where the lines between them are. Regions that grow stronger push against the centre, and regions that grow weaker become a drain on everyone else.

3) A feudal state gives land to local rulers, who in return owe soldiers, taxes and whatever else has been agreed. Outside those duties the local lords can do as they please. Feudal states last best when messages are slow and in wartime, when laws and courts turn into polite suggestions. They always collapse eventually, when times change and someone else pulls power together.

Of Utility for Daub

Now let us apply all this to Daub.

Thus: why is Your Grace allowed to rule? How much power does Your Grace really have? And how should Daub be organized?

You rule because you have shown you can. Daub inherited a feudal arrangement: lords whose titles come from Wattle, the Church and the Temple, the growing Merchants Guild, various gangsters you have propped up, and so on. That is safe only as long as Your Grace treats it as temporary. You keep the records and the intelligence, you have men with sharp knives, you have kept certain forces in check, so daily life goes on without much upheaval.

However: one visible failure, such as an enemy who prospers or a crisis you hesitate over, and the people who praised your competence will suddenly remember they always had doubts. Personal loyalty will only carry you so far. . As the roads get better, the merchants get richer and Singhapura starts paying closer attention, Daub will lose the room. To be blunt, Your Grace, your power rests largely on the fact that you control the streets and nobody has yet seriously tried to take them from you. The Merchants Guild hasn’t yet thought it worth fighting you in the open. The nobles Allant installed haven’t started working together, and the lords who were pushed out haven’t turned their full attention on Daub. Singhapura hasn’t decided what to do with you. Power like that is a castle wall made of paper: it might look impressive from a distance, but anyone can walk through it.

Rukarya, the political theorist, called Daub’s lack of tradition dangerous. He meant that with no old customs holding it back, the city could go in any direction. I think he was only half right. Old states come with old quarrels, and Daub hasn’t had time to collect many. It hasn’t decided what kind of city it is yet, either. If Your Grace moves quickly, you can decide that for it.

My recommendation is to make either the federal or unitary state real before anyone notices. I would work toward systemic power. The courts, and the keeping of order and justice, are a good place to start, followed by contracts. This is a solid defense against this uncertainty.

Laws are useful, even when they seem they weaken you; especially if they weaken you. People find it reassuring to think of you as bound by law, and it allows your enemies no excuse for being bound the same way; it makes them look scandalous when they break the rules.

The second step is to more seriously trade and public works, and parcel out institutions to deal with these things. Empower them by law, and you end up with a large structure that holds you up and acts as a safe method for using the talents of those who want to change the face of Daub without making them depose of you first.

Folio X · Of Provinces

Transcribed by Victor Konara