La Romana (The Steelyard)

I am the Steelyard, the portable balance with its sliding weight that travels with the merchant. While the fixed Scale sits in the market hall, I ride with the caravan. I set the rate: forty to the caravan master, sixty to the compound, with a counterweight that shifts as the caravan grows. I am the policy of fairness, written in brass and iron.

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A caravan master from Fez once slid my weight all the way to his side — ninety for him, ten for the compound. The merchants revolted; the compound starved. The Scribe came and locked the weight at forty-sixty, with a catch: the more travellers the master brought, the more the counterweight slid toward him. By the third season, he was rich and the compound was rich. The Steelyard teaches: greed breaks the beam; growth balances it.