Chapter 60: The Merchant Problem
Aldric Voss operated from a trade house in Novigrad's merchant district.
Three stories of prosperity built on decades of careful dealing—connecting buyers with sellers, contractors with clients, opportunities with those who could exploit them. His business model relied on being essential, the middleman whose connections made transactions possible.
I intended to make him useless.
"The intelligence is comprehensive," Tom said, spreading his findings across the Oxenfurt planning table. "Aldric has three major revenue streams: trade route brokerage between Redania and Temeria, contractor placement for security and combat work, and... less legal facilitation services."
"The assassination funding."
"Among other things. He's careful—uses intermediaries, maintains deniability, keeps his own hands clean." Tom pointed to specific documents. "But his business connections are traceable. And those connections are vulnerable."
I studied the network map he'd constructed. Aldric's operation depended on relationships—merchants who trusted him to find reliable shipping, clients who trusted him to find capable contractors, institutions who trusted him to be discreet.
Trust was fragile. Trust could be destroyed.
"Primary targets?"
"His three largest merchant clients. They account for sixty percent of his brokerage revenue. If they shift to other brokers, his business model collapses." Tom circled the names. "Secondary targets: the banking houses that provide his credit. He's overextended—gambling debts, failed speculation, bribes to officials. If his creditors lose confidence..."
"Then his financial foundation crumbles along with his business relationships."
"Exactly."
The campaign began subtly.
Guild contacts—merchants we'd served reliably over years of operations—received carefully worded suggestions. "Alternative brokerage options exist. Better rates, faster service, more reliable guarantees. Perhaps worth exploring."
We didn't attack Aldric directly. We simply offered better alternatives.
Within two weeks, his largest merchant client had shifted thirty percent of their business to a competitor broker. The second-largest followed within the month. The third held longest, loyalty or inertia keeping them connected, but eventually they too began exploring options.
"His revenue is down forty percent," Tom reported at the three-week mark. "He's scrambling to find replacement clients, but the market's tight and his reputation for reliability has been... questioned."
"Questioned how?"
"Rumors. Nothing traceable to us. Just observations shared among merchant circles that his recent service has been inconsistent, his fees higher than alternatives, his guarantees less certain." Tom's expression held professional satisfaction. "The market does our work for us once we start the momentum."
The interference continued for six weeks. By the end, Aldric had lost sixty percent of his regular business. His trade house staff—once fifteen people—had been reduced to six. His presence in merchant circles had shifted from respected broker to desperate competitor.
But the business attack was only the first phase.
Tom's intelligence had identified Aldric's debts with precision.
Three major loans: gambling losses to a Novigrad syndicate (thirty crowns), failed investment speculation (forty-five crowns), and bribes to customs officials that had never produced the promised returns (twenty-five crowns). Total debt: one hundred crowns, against declining revenue and shrinking assets.
"Two of the debts are transferable," Tom explained. "The gambling losses and the failed speculation. The original creditors would prefer guaranteed payment over continued uncertainty."
"Purchase them."
"That's fifty crowns. A significant investment for—"
"For destroying someone who tried to kill me three times. Worth every copper."
The debt purchase happened through intermediaries—Aldric never knew who had acquired his obligations. He simply received notification that his creditors had changed, and that the new holders were demanding accelerated payment terms.
"He can't pay," Tom confirmed a week later. "His current revenue doesn't cover operating expenses, let alone debt service. He's trying to consolidate, negotiate extensions, find emergency funding."
"Don't let him."
The pressure intensified. I demanded partial payment through intermediaries, forcing Aldric to liquidate assets at unfavorable rates. When he missed a deadline, I demanded the full remaining balance—knowing he couldn't deliver, knowing the demand would further damage his credit standing.
His remaining creditor—the customs official he'd bribed—heard about the financial difficulties and began demanding their own accelerated payment. The cascade effect multiplied the pressure beyond what I'd directly applied.
"He's approaching bankruptcy," Tom reported at the two-month mark. "Assets nearly depleted, credit destroyed, business in freefall. One more push should finish him."
"Then we provide the final push."
The evidence of Aldric's assassination funding went to three destinations simultaneously.
First: Redanian authorities. Not enough proof for criminal conviction—Aldric had been careful about deniability—but enough to warrant investigation. The authorities began reviewing his financial records, interviewing his former associates, asking uncomfortable questions.
Second: His remaining business contacts. Merchants who'd stayed loyal despite his declining fortunes received careful documentation showing that their trusted broker had funded multiple murder attempts against a legitimate guild master. The association was toxic—nobody wanted to be connected to someone under investigation for assassination funding.
Third: Adventurer networks across the continent. The same channels we'd used to destroy the Red Falcon company's reputation now carried information about their funder. Aldric Voss, respectable merchant, had paid to have a guild master killed. Three times. And had failed each time, demonstrating both his moral bankruptcy and his incompetence.
The combined effect was devastating.
His remaining clients abandoned him within days. The investigation froze his assets. His family—a wife and two adult children who'd maintained careful distance during his business troubles—formally separated themselves from his activities.
Within two months of the public revelation, Aldric Voss was finished.
He fled Redania before formal charges could be filed, his trade house seized by creditors, his reputation destroyed beyond recovery. The last report from Tom's network placed him in Kovir, working as a clerk for a minor merchant house—the only employment someone with his tainted name could obtain.
I gathered the guild leadership for debriefing after Aldric's exile was confirmed.
"Two assassination sources neutralized," I said, reviewing the campaign's results. "The Red Falcon company dissolved and their best fighters absorbed into our ranks. Aldric Voss bankrupted, exiled, and permanently discredited."
"Total cost?" Mira asked.
"Approximately sixty-five crowns plus significant time investment. In return: three skilled fighters added to our roster, two major threats eliminated, and a message sent across the continental adventurer community."
"What message?" Viktor's voice crackled through the message crystal from Novigrad.
"That attacking the Covenant has consequences beyond simple retaliation. We don't just survive assassination—we consume the attackers. Their organizations, their finances, their reputations. Everything they built becomes fuel for our growth."
The room was quiet for a moment. The brutality of the campaign wasn't lost on anyone—comprehensive destruction of two separate enemies, executed methodically over months.
"Was there a third source?" Tom asked. "The poison attempt never traced definitively."
"Possibly. If so, they've gone silent—either scared by what happened to their partners or waiting for better opportunity." I considered the question seriously. "We maintain heightened security regardless. The message we've sent might deter future attempts, or it might convince our remaining enemies that they need to be more careful."
"And if there are more attempts?"
"Then we respond the same way. Every attack strengthens us. Every assassination failure adds to our reputation as unkillable. Every enemy we destroy adds to our resources while subtracting from theirs." I stood, moving to the window. "Eventually, the cost of attacking us becomes so high that nobody's willing to pay it. That's the goal—not invincibility, but perceived invincibility."
"That's a lot of enemies to make along the way."
"We didn't make these enemies. They made themselves our enemies when they decided to try killing me." I turned back to face the room. "I didn't start this conflict. But I'm damn well going to finish it."
Alone in my quarters, I reviewed the campaign's full accounting.
Two organizations destroyed. Three skilled fighters recruited. Sixty-five crowns invested, returned through absorbed assets and reduced security costs. The mathematics of vengeance, calculated and executed with precision.
"Is this what I've become? Someone who destroys enemies methodically, who converts assassination attempts into organizational growth, who measures victory in crowns and casualties?"
The question bothered me less than it probably should have. The alternative—letting enemies attack without consequence, showing weakness that invited further aggression—would have been worse. Building something worth protecting meant being willing to protect it.
The Ciri meeting still glowed in my memory, a contrast to the brutal efficiency of the counter-attack campaign. That interaction had been about building rather than destroying—establishing connection, creating possibility, laying foundation for a future I hoped to shape.
Both approaches were necessary. Building relationships with people who mattered. Destroying threats from people who opposed me. The guild required both capabilities to survive what was coming.
[GUILD STATUS UPDATE]
[Phase 2 Progress: 75%]
[Members: 21 (including 3 former Red Falcon fighters)]
[Outposts: 3 major (Oxenfurt, Novigrad, Vizima)]
[Treasury: 209 crowns]
[Threats Neutralized: Red Falcon Company, Aldric Voss]
[Key Relationships: Ciri (first contact established), Witcher School (alliance active), Geralt (observation ongoing)]
Three-quarters of Phase 2 complete. The guild had grown from desperate survival to continental presence. From hunted target to hunter. From reactive defense to proactive offense.
The fall of Cintra was still perhaps two years away. The Wild Hunt's pursuit of Ciri was still further beyond that. Time remained to prepare, to strengthen, to position.
But time was also running out.
I pulled out the reports on Novigrad outpost repair—forty crowns needed to restore the building damaged by sabotage. Another expense in an endless stream of expenses. Another demand on resources that never seemed sufficient.
The work continued. It always continued.
Tomorrow I would authorize the repairs, review contract volumes, coordinate with Viktor on operational adjustments. The guild required constant attention, constant investment, constant effort.
But tonight, I allowed myself a moment of satisfaction. Two enemies destroyed. One crucial relationship begun. Progress toward a future I was fighting to create.
The message crystal on my desk glowed with incoming communication from Kaer Morhen—Vesemir reporting on restoration progress, probably. Another thread in the web I was weaving.
I reached for the crystal and began the next conversation, the next step, the next movement in the endless game of building something that might survive what was coming.
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