The World Dragon's Heir

Chapter 499: Updated Timeline

The rains came at the same time that the first airships out of Axbridge and northern Cygnia arrived. The regular route airships that travelled the regions had been redirected due to extreme weather, and these had been chartered to bring Nobles to Wistover.

That left Dominic in a pinch.

They were still rearranging the event grounds in the gardens, and the infrastructure team was working overtime to build an extra level in one of the warehouses, so they could use it as extra housing for new arrivals.

The guest camps were being relocated smoothly, as far as he knew, but they were out of empty houses to put any new people in, and there weren’t many empty beds in town, either.

The airships were likely to be staying on location until the storms calmed, and a few people could stay in them. But given how the others had arrived, standing room only and struggling to maintain altitude, that would not do much to help their issues.

"My Lord, if you have a moment, the airship construction team requests your presence." One of the city guards informed Dominic nervously as he worked on paperwork for the Merchant Guild orders they had placed to keep up the supply levels for the event.

"Just the distraction I need. Julio, I will return in under an hour."

The Castellan sighed as the Duke got up to leave.

"At least finish signing off on these purchase orders first."

Dominic sat back down and went over the orders line by line. Even if he was eager to get away from the paperwork, he wouldn’t slack on proofreading the orders for mistakes.

The last thing they needed was a full shipment of something useless because of a careless quantity mistake.

Ten minutes later, the orders were ready to be sent to Rill, and Dominic was out the door, headed for the airship factory.

On the way, he had to pass the Merchant Guild warehouses, and Dominic noticed that there were actually three caravans staged in the city today. That was far more than they needed for what they had ordered, and as far as he knew, the warehouses were already filling with stored goods to be sent out during the wet season before these storms started.

"Do you know what is up with the caravans?" Dominic asked the guard, who was still accompanying him.

"I believe that they’re stocking up for the new Barons and Knights.

There is a lot of talk about who will settle where within the territory, and the Merchants know that they’ll need a lot if they’re going to renovate the old Barony Houses to impress a noble bride.

But they’re also stocking things they expect you to order, and other things they expect the city to need.

I heard that they brought in an entire trailer full of cots, enough to supply a Regiment. If you forgive my presumption, Your Grace, I suspect they expect you to need to purchase them soon."

Dominic chuckled. "I suspect that they’re right. The Infrastructure team has been building a mezzanine into the new warehouse they were working on, and the report from Engineer Marco says that it would be a good spot to assign as sleeping quarters."

The guard nodded. "And stone floors are much harder than a mat on dirt or grass, so they’ll want cots if they’re setting up tents inside."

Dominic hadn’t thought of it that way. He had thought they would set it up like a dorm room. But setting tents inside would give some notion of privacy, and everyone had brought them.

Dominic smiled as he remembered doing the same thing many times before to escape storms, then struggled to merge that mental image, of a tent in an abandoned ruin to a bunch of Noblemen preparing to go to a party.

"Alright, let’s see what the airship shop has to say, and then I will go and work on arranging more space for visitors.

This weather is going to mess everything up, more than a regular wet season would." Dominic replied with a sigh.

The guard shrugged. "It’s not all bad. With so many Noblemen in town looking for wives, we don’t have to worry about them messing with our daughters. Plus, the amount of money they spend is pretty good.

My wife works at the bakery, and they’ve been insanely busy with all the pastry requests."

"That’s inevitable, I think. They’re the only major bakery in town at the moment, and the whole town is growing. I’m surprised that they’re still keeping up with demand."

The guard laughed. "Oh, they’re not. They’re baking constantly while they’re open, and they’ve hired an overnight shift to make the bread, so that the morning crew can focus on pastries and coffee grinding."

"Thankfully, we’ve got Beth. Without her baking, the Manor would be in real trouble. But even she is struggling to keep up with demand, and the Manor has a rather impressive kitchen."

They were also cooking in some of the other buildings, where Larry could prepare the soups, stews and gravies, taking some strain off the main staff.

There were many more foods in sauces than usual for Cygnia, more akin to Axbridge cuisine. But that was because the only food Larry understood was soup. If it wasn’t in a sauce, it wasn’t food he was willing to cook.

He would consider roasting meat. You just had to rescue it before he put the resultant roast meat in the stew for flavour.

The Dwarves were waiting for him when Dominic arrived at the airship factory, excited smiles on their faces.

"We’ve got a prototype. Full scale, with the basic amenities included. Come check it out and let us know what you think.

It’s been quite the adventure trying to treat an entire farm worth of cloth to cover the bloody thing, but we’ve got a system down now. We filled it this morning, and it seems to be holding helium.

It’s anchored to the floor, but as soon as we start to deflate the balancing bladders, it pulls the chains taut.

We might have to adjust that a bit, it’s almost too light when it’s fully unloaded. With full water tanks it’s a bit better, but still pretty light. We did a bit too well with the weight reduction."