Editing Port Blackheart (section)

===Economics===

Anything you can imagine comes through Port Blackheart. Exotic goods, some legal, some illegal arrive daily in the Black Dock and are sold in the vast market places and auction halls of the city. The goods leave Port Blackheart by boat mostly, the road out of Blackheart goes through Tomanda or Duatin Erethol and all travellers heading that way are searched very carefully. 

This black market trade is the greater part of Blackheart’s economy but it is supplemented by both normal trade and tourism. As well as the contraband and luxury goods that come through the city, a great deal of normal trade goes on too. If you’re willing to brave it you can often get a good price for normal goods in the port as the competition is so great, the law of supply and demand almost always goes in favour of the buyer.

The port is also a stop off point for pirates, mercenaries and freebooters with blood money or stolen goods burning a hold in their pocket. Hundreds of these types are to be found in the taverns and brothels of the city at any one time and the city is happy to take their gold. There is a certain poetic justice the fact that the scum that arrives in the city to spend their ill-gotten gains are just as likely to be found dead and stripped in an alleyway as an unsuspecting pilgrim who got on the wrong boat. No-one is safe in this place.

As well as their own private endeavours, the ruler and his lieutenants take a cut of everything that happens in the city. It is the responsibility of each man (for want of a better word) in the chain to ensure he’s not being swindled by those below him (or not more than he’s happy with at least). The system largely works well, with weak links in the chain soon being disposed of and replaced. Obviously, this means that everyone in a position of power puts great stock in intelligence gathering and information and the ruler of the city needs to have the best information network of all to ensure that his tenure at the top is not too temporary.