It took until the Four-Day War for the Rossells to accept that this wasn't going to stop.

They were weavers, and the descendants of weavers. Five generations at least, and probably more; the second-largest family in the town weaver's guild, which was its largest, lots of herders in the hills near Roda de Ter and they were right near the top of the navigable river to ship it down to the real cities. And then cloth started coming up the river at prices they couldn't possibly match, and news said an archmage was making it, one who hated Cheliax and wanted them weak and fallen before him, and so for a while they hoped that when he'd conquered or been killed it would stop and they'd be able to sell their crafts again and the lean times would end.

But the War ended, and the Asmodean priests fled and half the nobles did too, and the cheap cloth kept coming. Even cheaper, if you bought in silver and gold, though the old Asmodean paper money was being given away like it was cursed, which maybe it was.

"He's ruined us!", her mother said, "He's supposed to be 'saving us from Asmodeus' but we're going to need saving from starvation if this goes another season! We need to do something to get him to stop."

"Mother, he's an archmage. He's half as cunning as a god and has a Grand Inquisitor of Abadar advising him, he can't have missed this."

"So we need to tell him why he should stop! Persuade him!", Mother said, well on the way to hysteria.

"No, Mother, I'm not thinking about that. That's in the past, it happened. One town's guild arguing with an archmage is like arguing with a storm. I'm thinking about what comes next."

"What?", Mother asked, too confused to reply.

"We're experts, our skills aren't useless, we just need to figure out what is used."

"But it's too cheap! We can't compete with this!"

"...It's too cheap! Of course!"

"What?"

"Nobles don't buy anything cheap. They don't have to, they're rich, and they want us to know it! They want us to see it! What will the nobles want now?"