Arascus sat down with Kassandora. Mam was busy right now and frankly, he imagihat Kassandora had a far better rapport with Essa than Mam did. “When are you pnning on going to assist the dwarves?”

  “I was going today, I’m going to have drag a telephone lio there.”

  “Before you go, we o do something.”

  “What?”

  “vince Essa that Baalka is to be awoken, she’s a mage, she’ll be able to ehe soul.” Kassandora sighed and looked at Arascus for a few moments.

  “And Anassa ’t do it?” She was asking the question because it had to be asked. But they both khe answer.

  “Would you trust to let Anassa into your mind?”

  King Richard VI of Allia sat in the meeting room of the Shadow cil with his wife Eleanor by his side. Her in the royal gown of Allia, him in a suit for kings, both with s over their heads. It was a rge room in the pace, with windows leading to the empty tryside gardens outside. A few horses were trotting about, with some of the local aristocrajoying the sunshine. Richard looked over at his beautiful wife, her lovely golden hair falling down her bad then to the members of the Shadow cil; a much less pretty view.

  The Shadow cil, for its imposing name, had nothing to do with secret governance or subterfuge. The sellors were called that because they should stay as close to the as to be its shadow. Each of their names were public, all of them were elected officials by Parliament. They were the foremost method of unication the popution at rge had with the King, pro-monarchists would be elected when the popution was satisfied, republis would be elected when defiance was to be shown instead. Thankfully, in the ret ele, driven by the unity and fanaticism of Epan Separation, the monarchists had won an overwhelming majority.

  So Richard sat there and sighed. Of the nations which had taken part in Epan Separation, Wissel had vinced him that Allia would be hit the least. Richard had believed it. Who hadn’t believed it in fact? Lubska was always going to be an invasion route for the Pantheon. Rilia was exposed too, Doschia and Rancais were on the ti as well. Allia was an isnd, Allia should have been safe, Allia was untouchable.

  Well. Allia was in fatouchable. The os ehat nn army would step foot here, and the Anktydan blockade ehat no a single supply got in. The only exception was air-cargo from Epa, precious phat shipped Lubskan grain here and Allian eo be put into Dos tanks. The entire ti had pooled its civilian airfleet into ECCAF, the Epan Coalition bined Air Fleet. The Allian officers in Camford who were direg the nightmare that was ECCAF would be remembered in the books as some of the greatest logistis in all history. The fact that there hadn’t been a single collisiohat the crews were getting rotated as they o be, that transtors were there for every po deal with each Epan nguage, that somehow, the pnes actually nded on time, that fuel was always there to make sure they could go bato the air, was, quite frankly, incredible and record-shattering. It had more than a thousand heavy cargo pnes, eae carrying more than a huons. Potentially, at any one point in time, there could be more than a huhousand tons of supplies in the skies above Epa.

  A single rge cargo ship could hawo-hundred and twenty thousand.

  Richard smiled to himself. A single ship had double the tonnage of all ECCAF. Every city in Allia with docks was already overflowing with parts. Allia was supposed to be the beati in the Coalition for specialist parts. Well, Allia had dos job, the heart did beat, but the veins were all clogged. “The Parliament has approved the trol Orders Bill.” Richard said, frankly, whether they passed it or not didn’t really matter. There were ways to achieve everything he wao achieve today, the C.O.B. simply made things smoother. “It is time to discuss rationing.”

  That was the word of the day, it had been for the past week in fact. Already shops had started limiting sales to ers, but the chaos of private enterprise had to be repced with the stagnating trol of gover, it wasn’t about ensuring quality of life. It was about ensuring life. “In regards to that, where should we start?” Lord Bertrand asked, a tall skinny man, Minister of the Ey. Royalist. Bald. Gsses.

  “The easy part first.” Richard said as he leaned back. “Food.”

  The fact that food rationing was the easy part was so terrible Richard wao ugh at the sheer horror of it. He didn’t, because it was true.

  Richard turo Duke Maximilian. Minister of Agriculture. Royalist, although all aristocrats were. Short hair. Dark suit. Quite muscled and lean. An unorthodox man though, quite popur amongst the popution because of how much time he spent with farmers in the tryside. Every month, there would be a new image of the man wrangling sheep ging holes in fields. “I told you to prepare notes.”

  “Ah yes.” Duke Maximiliam spoke in a low voice, fitting for a man who did so much work outside. He tapped the folder oable as every other of the miuro him. “Firstly, the hard rationing we ot promise on.” The man pulled out a list. “Lamb, beef, pork and poultry we have no choice but to set trols on.” Richard felt Eleanor’s hand take his, already they were starting off badly. That was all meat basically. “Lamb, due to the prevalence of sheep in the north, have looser restris. The others…” Maximiliam trailed off and had to take a sed tain trol. “Well, it has to be redistributed trally to make sure the general poputiohe required proteins and calories. If we don’t, we’re signing the cities to vegetarianism for who knows how long. High-effort jobs have extended rations too, to get people out of the offices and onto the trains.” Richard smiled at that, the train workers had been strikily.

  “It will be done.” Richard said. “Arthur, write it down, all meats to be rationed. Maximilian, I expect you to work out the intricacies of weight and so on.” Arthur was Richard’s secretary. At least for today, it was the sort of position that was used to train new court assistants rather be anyone of importance.

  “I was actually thinking of rationing by price.” Maximilian said. “Otherwise there will be runs ocheries for when the good cuts of meat bee avaible.”

  “Specifics are yours Maximiliam, .” Richard sped him up.

  “All dairy products. We simply don’t produough milk. We ’t import enough either through ECCAF. There is no substitute.” Maximiliam said as Arthur scrambled to write. “All products made with imported sugar too, although that may be good for the general health of the popution.”

  “It won’t be for morale.” One of the other ministers spoke up. There was some ughter at that and Maximiliam nodded.

  “In regards to that, I am w on publishing the Austerity Cookbook.” Maximiliam said and Elliot, Minister of Education, coughed. An intellectual man, from Camford, tall and skinny. He looked out of p the suit of a bureaucrat and not the jumper of a professor.

  “I would like to raise a point on this ter.” Elliot said. “But tinue.”

  “It’s just a cookbook with recipes we work on. Carrot cake and the like. Things people will like, vegetable pie is aomorrow, I will be running a petition on EIE for who make the best foods with only locally sourced goods.” Maximiliam finished.

  “Have you thought about Vitamin deficies?” Duke William asked, Minister of Health. A true phinthropist, the man had been involved in a sdal some years back when his wife sued him for recklessly spending on the poor. He was emptying their treasuries so quickly that if she didn’t stop him, the entire Noble House of Arcester would have gone bankrupt.

  “I want to provide all schools with bckcurrant juid rosehip syrup to be given out to parents. We don’t have enough milk for them anyway.” Maximiliam said. “And the Grow-Your-Own scheme is a better success than all predis said it would be. Even people in cities are growing tomatoes on their windowsills apparently.”

  “I hate to be the bearer of bad news.” Bertrand said. “But the storerooms are running out of seeds. What ECCAF brings is given away basically the day it arrives.”

  Richard asked the question this time. “What do you suggest then?”

  “I suggest we start charging for the seeds, or acceptiurns. A pound of vegetables for a packet of seeds or something of the like. If everything we gave away was grown, Allia would be able to feed all Epa with the amount of vegetables that should be here.”

  “Write that down.” Richard said. “Call it the Pound a Packet scheme. Don’t charge for it though.” Arthur’s pen furiously scribbled against the paper as the King of Allia turo Maximilian. “Is that everything?”

  “Everything has shes.” Maximilian said. “But fruit aables will fare better if we just let them be subject to avaibility rather than trols.” He looked through his notes o time and shook his head. “I have nothing else on such a short time scheme, we’ve covered the most important things anyway.”

  Richard took a deep breath. That was the easy part done.

  Hirious.

  People starving was the easy part.

  Richard turo the issue. It was ohat wasn’t rge yet, but it could spiral out of trol. “Chief Officer Lloyd. The report on criminality.” Chief Officer Lloyd, in a grey moustache and close cut grey hair, a blue suit, just as the poli the streets wore. He was head of all of poli Allia.

  “It is actually positive.” The man said. “Trends are generally good, serious criminality is going down; murders and the like. We’ve not had a single one in the whole try for a year now. Petty robberies are going up and…” He looked slightly uneasy with himself. “I actually have a radical proposal.”

  “Well?” Richard said as he leaned forwards. “Out with it.”

  “The chaos caused by the logistics shes is likely to cause starvation iies. Even if people won’t be dying of hunger, we be certain that malnutrition will be rife. And…” Lloyd looked down at his interlocked fingers and took a deep breath.

  “Well?” Richard asked.

  Lloyd finished, rallied himself and looked at everyone oable. “Ultimately, oal is to ehere is an Allia. I do not propose ging any of the ws, however I will say that we should give tacit permission to the criminal gangs that smuggling is now effectively legal.” Richard blinked as the eable turo the Chief Officer. The King did not shut down though, and it was Eleanor who leaned forward.

  Eleanor had always been blunt, but she wasn’t scolding the man. She spoke softly, as if genuinely inquiring. “Expin yourself Lloyd. What is this?”

  “I propose a massive cmp down on any known drug traffickers immediately. We get them off the streets within the week.” Lloyd said. “And then…” He took another breath. “Well, they’re smuggling drugs into the try even though we’re under blockade. We deal with them, we give them permission to smuggle food, we keep wat them, we allow them to keep profits untaxed. If we find a gram on powder on them, I propose the hangman immediately.” He shrugged. “I assume most will not take the risk when su easy alternative is provided.”

  “I see.” Richard said. “You’re saying we don’t cmp down on bck markets.”

  “When the war is done, we shut them down.” Lloyd said. “But whilst the war is going on, the bck market be viewed as a redistribution of goods.” He spread his arms out. “If we’re building a safety for the popution, then the bck market is a sed for those who fall through the first one.”

  “And what happens to those who fall through this ooo?” Bertrand asked. Lloyd locked eyes with him as he answered coldly.

  “They starve.”

  “I actually agree with this idea.” Eleanor said.

  Richard nodded along. “I cur too, we’re fighting against the try starving here.” The entire room seemed to rex as Lloyd wiped sweat off his brow.

  “It is radical, and I don’t like it, but…” He sighed.

  “It is sensible.” Richard said. “Problems down the lih it ter on though.”

  “Of course.” Lloyd said lightly. “We’ll have a criminal problem ter, but that be solved. People starving to death ’t return back to life.”

  “Arthur, don’t write this down.” Richard said. Some things were better when they weren’t included in the minutes. “Lloyd, you have permission. I want this dourn the dealers into patriots.” There was some ughter at that, Richard had to make the joke, because now they were finally out of the children’s se of this pool of problems.

  Another problem down. Richard turo the issue. One word which chilled the atmosphere iire room, this was the part he had been dreading. “Everyone now, I asked everyone for opinions on this.” He sighed. “Electricity.” Takiricity out of a city was akin to taking the blood out of a man. The tial tries had this issue too, but they had plentiful reserves of coal. They had Karaina to trade with. They had forests to fell. They didn’t have to extract gas from the o.

  They weren’t an untouchable isnd.

  The entire room fell silent for a few moments. “Rolling bckouts.” Betrand broke the silence. “It has to be done, we simply ot power the try at this point. There is not enough fuel for the stations. Rancais is sending us what they through the undersea cables, but I expect them to be cut eventually when Anktyda realizes they are there.”

  “I actually agree.” Maximilian said. “We ’t lie to the poputioher, we give them dates and hours of when bckouts will occur in each region. I wao mention this before, but the Pound a Packet scheme should also include kettles.”

  “Kettles?” Richard raised an eyebrow and Maximilian nodded.

  “Yes, I’m not being farcical here. We already have power surges at seven in the m and six at night. It’s because of the whole try brewing their tea.” Even though the topic was silly, Richard realised the issue the more the man spoke. When was the st time he missed his m tea or coffee either? “We want to rid the popution of kettles, or at least get rid of enough of them that they stop making the praph look like this.” He made a line in the air with his finger, with two noticeable spikes that went from the table to above his head.

  “Write that down Arthur. Kettles into the Pound a Pack scheme.” Richard said. “Will it make a differehough?”

  “We go step by step.” Maximilian said. “We cut the fat so that the hospitals stay on.”

  “I would go further.” Elliot said, the professor-esque Minister of Education. “We cut heating to certaiioirely, it’s still the summer, we have months to adjust the popution at rge to the idea of what I’m calling DHZ, Designated Heating Zones.”

  “It would be brutal.” Lloyd said. “If we start cutting power to heating.”

  “Baby steps. Kettles first.” Elliot said. “Theween the hours of two to six we cut power. Expand to oo six, then twelve to seven.”

  “I was wanting to suggest alternative fuel sources.” Maximilian said. “Wood and the like.”

  “We would deforest Allia entirely within the year if we started burning wood.” Elliot said. “But for rural areas, I would ence it. It’s cities that are the problem here. City blocks don’t have firepces.” Richard nodded along, this is why no one wao touch this issue. There was simply no way to fix it without grinding the nation to a halt.

  “What is with the DHZs you mentioned?” Richard asked.

  “Public libraries, schools, town halls, gyms and swimming pools. Anything that fit a rge amount of people should bee a DHZ where people go to stay warm. These, we heat with electricity.” Elliot said. “I tacted Camford to run the numbers on this. On what we could use to heat the try I mean.”

  “And?” Richard asked.

  Elliot shook his head. “From top to bottom. Our coal is not as as the Epan coal, we would cause smog if we started burning in mass to warm cities. Rural areas ha, cities ot or we would drowning our own people in smog. Wood is a short term resource, I have no issue with cutting the forests down, most of them are pntation woods anyway so there’s no historical value in them but…”

  “There’s a but?” Lloyd asked in disbelief.

  “Wood has other uses.” Elliot said. “When you Maximiliaiohe Austerity Cook book, we already have a problem.”

  “We have a problem with a book?” Maximilian asked.

  “With paper.” Elliot said and Richard realised the scale of the issue. “Paper ot be reasonably moved through ECCAF when we’re moving food through it. The try will run out of paper in a week, maybe two. I’ve already instructed all schools to start takibook donations or moving to eleic. Camford is emptying its storerooms to send books to the schools in the area, but…”

  “I see.” Maximilian said.

  “The Austerity Cook Book is an excellent idea because again, how long will we actually be able to power the try for?” Elliot asked. “So it should be printed immediately.”

  “I have a draft.” Maximilian said. “There’s spelling mistakes in there probably, but there’s a draft.”

  Bertrand shook his head and crossed his arms. “It’s fittiioion book.” Richard had never heard such a miserable chorus of pained ughs. He sighed a back to Elliot. The professor the joke, saw the King looking at him and tinued.

  “Simply said, there is no good answer. We simply have to keep cutting until we reach a baseline where we keep the industry and critical infrastructure on.” Elliot said with a sigh. “I was going to ask about fuel, but I see from your face Thomas that it isn’t an option.”

  Thomas was the Minister of Transport. Stocky, bald, also with a moustache. He had lost his hair long ago, when w in the mihe man in charge of making sure the roads don’t have potholes and that the trai everywhere on time. The man was talented, Richard had to give it to him even with the train strikes ongoing now. That had brokewenty-three month strike-less streak. It souerrible, but it was actually the sed lo in history. The only other time that the train-workers had not gone on strike for such a long time was before the traied. “I actually have a solution. We luckily have a good amount of stored fuel, enough for twenty months more or less with austerity measures, although if we’re going to be burning it for power, it will be less.”

  “We don’t want to burn it.” Bernard Hinleck said, a man who had been a student of logistics a few months ago at Camford Uy, and now was the maihod of unicatioween the and ECCAF. Skinny, and the you here by a dozen years. “ECeeds it to refuel pnes. If the birds enough fuel to nd, take-off, and fly back to Epa tial, we would o cut the amount of weight we load on them by roughly a third.”

  “A third?” Thomas asked.

  “I actually had this idea too.” Bernard said. “To cut the amount of fuel we’re using so I ran the numbers. As it is, ECCAF is already not keeping up.”

  “What would be cut?” Richard asked.

  “Medie yhness. ECCAF brings in food, then medical supplements, then medie, then critical eleics.” He shrugged. “Critical eleics, I’ve cut as much as possible already, we ’t cut anymore.”

  “What are those?”

  “Materials to repair sor panels and wind farms, devices for the police, mae goods for industry and hospital maery. We’re as bare-bones as it gets. In a month from now, if a car part isn’t made in this try, you won’t be able to get it.”

  “So no toug ECCAF’s fuel.” Richard said. “Arthur, write that down. Thomas, your proposal?”

  “We ration all civilian fuel.” He said ftly. “I have the proposal written in specifics already.” He pulled a paper out of his folder and slid it to the King. “But summed up, fuel will be split into two categories, civilian and essential fuel. Civilian fuel will be dyed to ensure pliance, essential fuel won’t be.” He sighed. “Numbers are still adjustable, but it should about three gallons a week per vehicle in urban areas. Exemptions will be for public buses but not taxis. And alsh-efficy cars, the number should be ten gallons for rural areas, although I would like to run numbers by you two as well.” Thomas slid a paper to Elliot and ao Bernard.

  “And for farmers?” Maximilian asked.

  “Agriculture and logistics obviously ot be touched.” Thomas said. “Either you walk to shops that have locally sourced food or you drive to shops that have locally sourced air.” He took a sigh. “Additionally, this will require a tightening ution, but we o start looking at fuel effi routes.” Thomas turo Bertrand, the man behind the ey. “I don’t know if this is possible in any way, but there needs some way to make trug panies not go on long routes.”

  Bertrand sighed. “I’ll see what I do.”

  Lloyd spoke up. “Your train strike Thomas, you deal with it?”

  Richard spoke up. “I was about to say. We’re in an exceptional sario, the traio run, and they o run on time.”

  “So do we want them broken up?” Lloyd asked and Thomas sighed.

  “Give me a week to iate with the leaders. I’ll inform them of the situation.”

  “We don’t have a week Thomas.” Richard said. “You have two days. The traio be running.” A train was worth a dozen trucks on the road. During times of Peace, there would be time to iate, but everyday that the train workers were on strike was two days lost in fuel reserves.

  Thomas sighed and nodded. “I will see what I do.”

  Richard leaned bad looked at everyone in the room. What a depressing sight they were, but then that sight was fitting for the situation of the try as a whole. All the main topics had been covered, this meeting had not been to discuss the war logistics, those were handled by the other leaders and by ECCAF. Allia had a war at home to fight. “If anyone else would like to speak up, I would advise you do so now.” Richard said. “Otherwise, we meet again in a week.”

  One man did speak up. Emmahe man in charge of the Fn Office: Allia’s department for diplomatic affairs. He had a sharp jawli dark eyes that were unusually sharp. “I do.” He said. The eable turo him. Richard rolled his hand to indicate to the man to go forwards. “It is radical.” He said.

  “Well we’ve had a lot of that today already.” Lloyd said.

  Emmanuel shook his head. “More radical than anything like that, with sequences…” He sighed. “Diplomatisequehat may even strain our retionship with the Epan Coalition.” He looked at them all. “But, it would solve the food issue. Or dampen it at least, and that would ease up on all our other problems too.”

  And now, Richard was intrigued. He leaned forwards. “What is it?”

  Emmaook a sigh. “We tact Arcadia and ask for floromao assist.”

  Now that it was said like that, it really was obvious. Floromancers were magis that could enhahe fertility of soil, that cut increase the bounty of pnts, that could speed up growth from a whole season to a week.

  And if they asked for help from Arcadia, they were effectively aligning themselves with Goddess Essa.

  With the woman who had cracked a ti.

  Who had just drowned more than a quarter of a billion people.

  Where the death t could be measured a pertage of the total human popution, and not a number.

  He leaned bad thought. For once, he could not think quickly. Either they dealt with the devil of massacre in Arcadia or they brought the devil of austerity to Allia.