"So, a lot of people really hate what they call 'price-gouging', when there's a shortage of something and the price of it shoots up. And of course it mostly looks, to a typical consumer, like it's just a seller taking advantage; the buyer imagines that they 'already had' the right to buy something at the price it was yesterday, and not having it any more feels like a loss. They did have that right - yesterday. Once it's scarce the price changes. But let's suppose something goes wrong with the Sphinx River - suppose it flows backwards for a day or something in some kind of magical disaster, and it's all salt close to the coast till the situation's resolved. Because and only because you can then charge more for water, some clerics will trek downriver - well, in this situation I suppose it's upriver - even if it's dangerous to get on a boat, even if they were busy, even if they were retired, because they want the money. So then Sothis has more clerics who can make water than it had yesterday, precisely when it needs them. The river returns to normal, they all go home, no one's died of thirst and everyone is paid for their trip and their orisons.

"And suppose your guild sets a minimum price - so much for a yard of plaid, say. And then you get a great deal on dye. You take it, obviously, you'll save money that way and have a little extra, but the customers never see a speck of it. You can't outcompete your guildmate, and you can't say 'today we have a special on anything in blue'. And meanwhile, people buy less fabric, because it's expensive. Could you be selling twice as much at three quarters the price if you hired more people, making more money and giving everyone more clothes? You'll never find out! There could be someone with their nose pressed up against your shop window thinking 'if only some of it was a little cheaper I could justify one square of it for a scarf' and their favorite color could be blue and you'll never know!"

"Are there reasons to raise prices Abadar does frown on? If you're... acting alone, I guess, and not working together."

"- well, there are times when it would be a foolish business decision for any number of reasons and make you less money. And I think sometimes people hoard their talents because they haven't really thought about what they would want for them, rather than because there really isn't anything. But otherwise no, I don't think so."

"Huh," says Mar, who has now disproven one of the few things she knew about Abadar. She may have to use her Truthtelling on Cicerone Hikmat later just to be sure. "How about - charging one price to some people and a different price to other people?"

"I think it's best if you have some kind of reason, but the reason can be that you don't like those other people and want to be paid more to put up with them. The more graceful way is to have a basic version of the thing and then a little extra service you charge kind of a lot for on top, and then people can self-sort, whether they'd like to be the some people or the other people - like if you got a deal on blue dye, someone who preferred red could choose to pay more to get red, but you can also do this even if the dyes cost you the same amount, so you don't alienate those with tight budgets while you get some extra money from anyone of means who doesn't care for blue."

"Huh," she says again, and for the same reason, though really if she was wrong about one she's not surprised about the other.

"Not what you were expecting?"

"No. I thought... that the things guilds do, or people the count has given a right of monopoly, or Mammon, are about making people pay them more than their goods are really worth, and that's un-neighborly at best, and usually bad or outright Evil, and Abadar would be against it. But it sounds like He doesn't mind if I try to get more than it's worth, as long as I don't do things to... I don't know, I think I might be able to guess which other things would be wrong in Abadar's eyes but I don't think I can say why."

"There's not a real amount things are worth. That's the miracle of trade. You trade because the things you're trading are worth different amounts to the parties and the amounts are both real and every time it happens - for that reason and not some other reason - the world is richer."

"Hmm. I think that will seem very profound and important when I understand it."

"There's more about that in the Manual of City-Building, it's a big part of why He likes cities."

"Because... more trade happens? Or some other thing. Or both."

"Because more trade happens and it can be more specialized. In a little village a single farm family grows most of what they eat, makes most of what they wear, mostly has to entertain themselves with whatever occurs to them on their own. They get a little good at all those things. In a city it makes more sense to get very good at something more specific."

"I think I see. If you took the Weaver's Guild and the Coopers and the river-captains and made us all train to do all of them we'd be worse, not just at our specialties but all worse. There'd be less cloth and worse - well, less nice cloth now - and less barrels or worse ones, and the riverboats would move slower and crash more. Is that about right?"

"Yes! All that and you'd spend more time at work. In Axis - well, people have fewer needs, but they still want things, and they have them for very little work indeed."

"Axis sounds nice." She hopes she makes it there. "I think I am still confused about the part where everyone has a different worth for things. How can you tell? How can they tell?"

"People do it in different ways, and not always very well. But they do it every time they buy something, for better or for worse - what does it feel like when you decide whether to buy this or that vegetable in the market?"

"...I would usually think about whether they look like good condition, and how much the merchant tries to cheat people, and whether the price is different from usual, and why. But I guess I also think about how much I like them and how far my silver will stretch for different foods."

"Right - you assess how valuable the vegetable is, both in general and for you, and you assess how valuable your money is, again both to the seller and to you - a low price means they are treating your money as that little bit more valuable, if less of it will go far enough to make it worth their while. You pick a good tradeoff, with good risks - the merchant maybe being a cheat is about that."

Good risks? No, that means 'risks good by being small', that's straightforward enough. Abadar doesn't dislike it enough to get rid of all risks, or at least not for mortals since nobody can. And they're valuing the money, which is why it's important for it to be something valuable like gold and silver, not paper.

"Hmm," she says, but it doesn't sound nearly as confused this time, "Are there passages of the Manual or the Order I should read about that? I didn't recognize anything like it on my first read of the Order but it's, uh..." Nearly impenetrable and she got considered for wizard school.

"Yes, let me find you some page numbers..." She goes and unlocks the books from the display case.

Both the copies of Manual of City-Building she's seen are beautiful books. The gold on this one's a little less tacky than the other one she saw, but well chosen.

(When she was thinking of designs to please the Countess and other nobles, she mainly turned her thoughts to things that the family had made for themselves and decorated the house with. To decorate the most important object of your work and keep it in pride of place in the temple is one of the few things about Abadar's Church that actually feels like home.)

Presently Hikmat's got each one open to relevant pages for her.

"Thank you, Cicerone, I'll read these for a while. Um, are there commentaries on the Order of Numbers? I found it... not very mortal? And I wouldn't think I'm the first."

"There are, I brought one of my favorites, and I'll lend it to you at a bond of ten silver."