A thousand leagues to the south lies the Tsaz Citadel.
The Tsaz live by a merchant code – they trade freely with anyone who wall accept their currency or barter terms. There is no such thing as an average Tsaz – the wide but roughly hewn tunnels and caverns are home to citadel and desert folk alike and many combinations in-between.
Preferential treatment is given to those who take currency rather than goods. Each transaction is officially taxed though there are thousands of transactions occuring every day which are not seen by the Brokers.
A Broker is a Tsaz official. They are licensed by the Citadel to levy a tax on every transaction occuring within the city and a percentage of this goes into their own pockets. Corruption, of course, is rife but this has the effect that the only people who really suffer are non-Tsaz who do not find a reputable Broker with whom to conduct business.
The Broker nobility are identified by their riches and their apparent extravagance. The Tsaz havea saying that “a penny dropped at home is always to hand” meaning that they will endeavour to spend their own money at their own businesses and a close-knit community of merchants may arise.
The Tsaz operate a thriving slave market but they also have very strict laws on the ownership of slaves. Slaves, as much as anything, are a commodity and anyone treating commodities poorly is someone not to be respected. An individual in servitude is recognised as having “fallen from the rocks†while they work off some considerable debt. Anyone arriving with the requisite amount of wealth and the intention of spending it will be treated as royalty. Those without means find themselves in debt as soon as they arrive as slaves within the day as they run out of money quickly and if they try to avoid the tax by dealing without a Broker, they will quickly find themselves clapped in irons.
The Tsaz also operate a tinker trade with independent merchants setting off into the deserts, trading with the desert tribes for survival and hoping to make a kiling with trade from other citadels and the desert tribes. The arrival of a Tsaz trade tour will bring not only new toys, gems, spices and weird trinkets but also ideas, games, stories, drama and adventure!