Chapter 37: Chapter 37: Managing Mapjess

Braydon’s first impression upon taking a closer look at the residence of Baron Monrow was that he now knew where he got all the money to wear the latest trends of the capital. His house was pretty bare, with the exception of the rooms that he would take guests. The man had loved sticking noble etiquette, so it was no surprise that he wanted to keep up appearances like a noble. Even if that meant that he tried to live beyond his means. 

Braydon had gathered all of the servants to check what Monrow had left him in terms of people he could use. It seems as though the man had a fondness for servants, Braydon did not know if that was for his ego or to further keep up appearances. Likely it was both. But with the amount of attendants it gave him an idea. ‘I can finally have someone to act as Nela’s attendant.’ It had almost been three months at this point and she still didn't have an attendant serving her. Braydon also found that Baron Monrow had hired a lot more females than his father had, so it would not be hard for Nela to find someone that she likes. 

On the other side of things there was only one butler, the rest of the men tasked with upkeep of the mansion. Other than that, Baron Abel’s knight had been staying in the mansion since he was caught. Braydon Presumed that these two would be the ones that he would want to question about how their previous lieges had run things. Unfortunately he had no such person from Baron Walker’s lands but running his land would not be too dissimilar to his other new acquisitions.

“For the current moment all of you will remain on staff.” This got a sigh of relief from many of the servants. They did not know the personality of their new lord and were worried that he might strip down the staff since he would not be staying in the mansion all that often. They had heard of his recent conquests so presumed he would either be staying in his original castle or taking up residence in the old viscounty mansion in Kirton, what was Baron Abel’s home. And they were right on that, Braydon intended to stay in Cliforge castle, it was more central to his land and more defensible.

“Though many of you will be moving to Cliforge castle or other places that you are needed, this place only needs minimal staff on hand when there is nobody living here. Especially the servants, my castle has a dearth of servants at the moment.” Braydon did not know how they would take having to move but he was severely understaffed in Cliforge, and it was not exactly a long distance between the castle and Mapjess.

“That will be all for the immediate announcements, you will be informed of what is happening in more detail later. For now, you may go back to your work. With the exception of you two.” Braydon dismissed the servants but kept the butler and the knight. These two would be a part of the in depth discussions, or at least part of them. Braydon had the butler lead them to the study, which he thought would have been as sparse as the rest of the house but was actually filled with books. ‘It appears that Baron Monrow at least had one hobby.’

“Are any of these books in relation to the running of the town?” Braydon asked the butler, if anyone knew it would likely be him.

“Most of these are books that the late Baron had bought from elsewhere, although there are some that were things that he had written himself.” The butler responded. He was dressed impeccably and spoke with perfect enunciation, probably a requirement that Monrow had when he looked for a butler. The man looked to be slightly older than Rhydian, and sported a neatly maintained moustache. His brown hair was equally neat, and that neatness carried with the rest of his demeanour. 

“Then I suppose we should get into the meat of the conversation, how was Mapjess run previously?” Braydon had noted that there might be something useful in the books that he might want to get someone to look through, but that could be done later. What he wanted to know was if there would need to be any significant changes to how the town was run.

“For the most part, it was left to its own devices. That is with two major exceptions, however. Baron Monrow was not fond of crimes in his holdings, he ensured that the garrison patrolled the streets regularly and kept things in line, quite a popular move with many of the townsfolk. He also kept a very high toll rate on merchants coming to Mapjess, used to pay for the latest fashion from the capital.” For the most part, what the butler said suggested the town was very well run. Especially compared to a significant portion of the nobility. Of course this gave Braydon his reason for not seeing many merchants in the area. Of the three baronies that now fell under his control, the only large population centre had high tolls. There was no reason for them to come here, only those selling food would be able to make a decent profit, and not because the toll was cheaper for food. It was just that everyone needed to buy it.

“Well, to start with, the toll needs to be lowered. I do not have the spending habits of the late Baron Monrow, nor do I intend to pick them up. Make sure that the merchants get to know about this, as well. It would be useless to lower the toll if nobody comes to sell their goods.” Braydon changed the first thing that stood out to him as a problem. For now he would have to see how things went with leaving the people to themselves, that did not mean that he would be lowering the patrols though, he thought that Baron Monrow had been onto something with that and did not intend to change it if it worked. Why would he break something that obviously works? He was not so bored to give himself more trouble than he already had.

“For now we will see how that goes. I think we now need to focus on the garrison to get the town up and running as fast as possible.” So long as the town had low crime and merchants coming, Braydon would not need to worry about it for a while. Though he would need to keep in mind that he might need to build more housing in the future.

 The problem was that his excess population was on the other side of the mountain range, and he was not about to let several hundred unorganised people walk through his castle. So for now, nothing could be done on this side of the Brimstones about housing. Instead, Braydon would have to focus his attention to sorting out military, rather than civilian, matters.