Building a Viking Empire with Modern Industry-Chapter 79: A Breach of Contract
The Royal Palace, Winchester (Capital of Wessex)
Princess Judith of Wessex was currently standing in the center of the Great Hall with tears of rage in her eyes as she argued with her stepson, Prince Aethelwold.
Aethelwold was a young man on the verge of his twenties and, as such, was a couple of years younger than Ragnar.
Being contemporaries, the young men shared absolutely no similarities in appearance or ideology; where Ragnar was the personification of cold, hard efficiency, Aethelwold was the embodiment of fanatical tradition.
He was gaunt and pale, wearing scratchy wool robes as a sign of piety, and he had his father’s watery, fearful eyes.
If one were to state what Aethelwold’s relationship with Judith was, it was that of an extremely paranoid religious officer, to the point where many would label him a zealot.
He had never been fond of Judith’s trade alliance with Ragnar and had voiced his concerns to King Aethelred many times.
The grudge between the Saxon Prince and the Viking Industrialist went back to the moment Ragnar sold them high-quality plows that made the Saxon serfs "too comfortable."
Until a year ago, Ragnar was considered a savage pagan incapable of understanding civilization. However, when this changed practically overnight, and Ragnar started becoming the CEO of the North, Aethelwold greatly feared his influence.
Of course, his fear always coincided with his envy; after all, he did not want to hand his kingdom’s economy over to any man, let alone a Viking. As such, it was not long before he began to detest Ragnar once more.
Ragnar had made many bold actions that did not sit well with a devout traditionalist like Aethelwold.
Ragnar’s open defiance of the feudal order, his spread of literacy to the peasants, and his liquidation of the Church’s monopoly on information were a far bigger deal to Aethelwold than any other members of the Royal Court.
Ragnar’s "Zoning Laws" which spat in the face of the divine right of kings, also managed to invoke the ire of the young Prince.
Still, all of those paled in comparison to Ragnar’s most recent revelation, which had crossed Aethelwold’s bottom line and made him have a great sense of disdain for the Director.
Ragnar’s public declaration that Gyda’s unborn child was the "Heir to the Directorate" and would be raised with "Science instead of Scripture" etched a deep sense of hatred into Aethelwold’s bones.
Yet despite all of this, Judith had continued to support Ragnar; Aethelwold could not imagine what sorcery Ragnar had played to control his stepmother’s mind to the point where she had defended his scandalous actions and continued to wear his velvet.
Ultimately, there was nothing he could do about the matter because it was an agreement King Aethelred continued to support—mostly because he liked the tax revenue.
However, King Aethelred had recently fled to the western border to "inspect the defenses" (hide from the Franks). Leaving Prince Aethelwold in charge of the capital as Regent.
As Regent, the first action he decided upon was to rescind the Trade Agreement between Wessex and Jernheim. Something which greatly upset the fashion-forward Princess.
Currently, she was pleading with her stepson to honor the contract with fury in her eyes.
"You cannot do this! Just because you are Regent does not mean you can go against your father’s wishes and embargo the North! The Frankish army is marching on York; if we cut ties now, Ragnar will fall, and the Franks will come for us next!"
Enraged by Judith’s insistence on supporting that industrial rogue, Aethelwold screamed from atop the wooden throne of Wessex as he tried to get his stepmother to see reason.
"He has openly mocked the Church! His ’Prime Minister’ is carrying a bastard child of science, and he intends to build a city that defies God’s laws of architecture! Why can you not see that he is a terrible influence? He is completely and utterly unfit to be our partner!"
Judith had never been so angry before in her life.
Her stepson’s insistence on ending the velvet trade was an obsession at this point, and she could not understand why he was so consumed with the idea of poverty.
She curled her manicured hands into fists as she shouted at the top of her lungs, the purple Jernheim Velvet of her dress shimmering in the torchlight.
"You are not the King, and you are most certainly not a businessman! You have no authority to bankrupt this Kingdom!"
Aethelwold was on the edge of his seat with rage; he could not tell what "marketing spell" Ragnar had cast upon Judith to make her so rebellious against her own faith and country.
Then again, the velvet was very soft.
The important matter at hand was that he had already made his decision, and as Regent, he felt as if it was in his authority to terminate the agreement.
"It is already done; I have sent a courier to that Viking informing him that his ships are no longer welcome in our ports! I have seized his assets in London! Now I do not want you wearing that heathen cloth ever again. Do you understand me?"
Aethelwold stood up, signaling his guards.
"Seize the velvet. Burn it in the courtyard. We will return to wearing honest, Christian wool."
Judith was so angry at Aethelwold that she blurted out her inner thoughts, which greatly wounded the man’s pride as a divinely appointed ruler.
"You fool! You are breaking a contract with a man who paves roads with his enemies! When Ragnar comes south, he won’t bring a sword—he will bring an audit!"
With that, Judith stormed off to her chambers before the guards could touch her dress, slamming the heavy oak door behind her.
She threw herself onto her bed and screamed into her pillow. She could not believe her supply chain with Ragnar had come to an end just like that.
She sincerely hoped that Ragnar would not resort to rash actions, like invading Wessex to enforce the contract forcefully.
The more she thought about such a possibility, the more she prayed that Ragnar would beat some sense into her fanatical stepson.
...
Meanwhile, on the muddy road north of London, a terrified courier was riding hard toward the Titan Defense Perimeter.
He carried a scroll sealed with the royal wax of Wessex. The contents were brief, pious, and suicidal.
"To the Director of Jernheim,
By order of the Regent of Wessex, Prince Aethelwold, your trade license is revoked. Your goods are declared contraband. Your ’Industrial Heresy’ is no longer welcome in the South. Repent, surrender your machines to the Church, and perhaps God will have mercy on your soul.
Signed,
Aethelwold."
Prince Aethelwold had no way of knowing that this letter, which he thought was a righteous strike against paganism, was essentially a breach of contract that would trigger penalty clauses Ragnar hadn’t even written yet.
As for how Ragnar would react to the news that his southern market had collapsed right before the Frankish battle? Only time would tell. After all, he was the type of man who was not afraid to leverage hostile takeovers to get what he wanted.
Ultimately, the Frankish Crusade was a physical threat. But Aethelwold’s embargo? That was an economic threat. And Ragnar took economic threats personally.
Judith sat in her room, clutching a sample of the velvet. She looked out the window toward the North.
"Please, Ragnar," she whispered. "Don’t just defeat the Franks. Come down here and fix the management."
Little did she know, Ragnar wouldn’t need to invade. He had already installed a "Trojan Horse" in the south.
Erik the Silent, currently undercover in the Frankish camp, also had contacts in the Winchester markets.
When the news of the embargo hit the merchant guilds of Wessex—who were making a fortune reselling Ragnar’s cheap steel—Aethelwold would find that the "Invisible Hand of the Market" had a very firm grip, and it was reaching for his throat.
But for now, the alliance was broken.
Ragnar stood alone against the Franks, with his southern flank exposed. It was the perfect storm for a corporate collapse. Or, for a man like Ragnar, the perfect opportunity for a total monopoly.
