From the moment Isabel Dulod assumed charge of her family's trade, she moved with swift precision, revealing both skill and foresight.
Her first decree was to draw a clear line between the House of Dulod's older ventures and the new partnership with Ryan, assuring him openly that no hidden snares would be laid against him.
Next, she summoned hundreds of laborers to hasten the works of the armory and the brickyards.
The brickworks, being simpler to raise, were soon completed. From their kilns came steady streams of blue and white bricks, piling high as hills.
Since Dessen was itself still in ruins, they began the first sales in the town. And when the northern folk—long accustomed to houses of timber, stone, and packed earth—saw these new bricks, they marveled.
Cheaper than quarried stone or sawed timber, more shapely and fair, and above all able to shorten the building-time of a home, the bricks were hailed as a treasure. The first production sold out swiftly, yielding Ryan and his companions their first gold—a hundred coins and more.
Word travels fast upon the East-West Road. Traders passing through caught scent of opportunity and pressed Isabel with offers of partnership. Within days the brickyards were filled with orders, and deposits alone had brought in several hundred more coins.
….
The triumph of the brickyards stirred fresh zeal among the smiths of the armory.
Through these weeks Ryan had not been idle. Together with Torvin, he gathered Dessen's craftsmen and set each place in order according to his design of a divided craft.
Every waterwheel was reshaped, each channel deepened, so that the river's strength might drive the hammers, the bellows, the grinders, and ease the hands of men.
Ryan himself wrote a volume—the Manual of the Armory-Works—and gave it into Torvin's keeping. Day after day the young lord poured over its pages, pacing the yards with the book in his hand, recording every note.
At last the furnaces were kindled. The heat shimmered in the air, iron flowed like molten fire along the troughs to the smiths.
"Open the gate!" came the cry, and the sluice at the river was loosed. Torrents struck the great wheels, setting them creaking into motion.
The hammers rose and fell with thunder, sparks leaping like stars from the red-hot metal. Each smith and apprentice wrought only his appointed piece, and thus the armory at last awoke, pouring forth the weapons Ryan desired.
A week later, the first full set of heavy infantry armor was borne out from the assembly hall.
It shone silver-white, wrought with helm, shoulder-plates, cuirass, and greaves. Beneath lay soft-padded garments of hemp and cotton, to turn aside the crushing blows of war-hammers.
In the shaping of its lines one could see the influence of Elvish craft, for the smiths of Dessen had learned much from Rivendell.
Grinwald himself came to behold it. He lifted the mail with both hands, testing its weight, and found it lighter by a third than the old armors, yet strong enough to withstand the heaviest smith's hammer.
"This," said the old warrior, "will give your soldiers threefold their chance of survival."
Ryan answered with a faint smile. "Aye, yet few are strong enough to bear it."
For heavy harness was not for all men. Only the Dúnedain and the Elves, tall and mighty of frame, could wear such in large number. Among other folk, the strong were too few.
Still, as the craftsmen grew used to their divided labors, the speed of the works quickened. Before long, Ryan would have all the panoply he had ordered.
….
One dawn, Ryan was walking the armory yards when Torvin came, weary-eyed and clutching a great ledger.
He was lord now in truth, yet before Ryan he carried himself as a pupil before his master.
"Lord Ryan," he said, leafing the pages, "yesterday the assembly yard completed fourteen sets of archer's gear. But the feathers for the arrows fall short. The merchants say we must wait three days for a caravan from the Shire."
Ryan was polishing the haft of a new-forged spear, the steel gleaming flawless beneath his hand.
"Let me guess," he said, "they claimed the cost was higher, for the trouble of transport?"
Miles blinked in surprise. "Yes! How did you know?"
Ryan laughed softly. "Merchants chase profit. The more we need a thing, the higher they set their price."
Torvin's face darkened as he realized the trick that had been played.
"Do not fret," Ryan said kindly. "The choice is ours, not theirs. If one will not sell, another will. Let word be sent to nearby villages, to other lords—whoever has feathers at the same price, we shall trade with them. In this world there are more sellers than we can count, and many eager to earn."
The young man's heart lifted, and his respect for Ryan grew deeper still.
….
And soon tidings came that stirred joy.
Idhrion and Erken had returned from the banks of the Bruinen with five hundred recruits. Likewise Alaina and Arioni had gathered another five hundred from the vales of the Hoarwellt.
Together they marched now toward the abandoned village at the forest's edge.
When Ryan heard this, he at once borrowed wagons and men from Torvin to bear the vast store of food he had bought—half a million pounds of grain—to the chosen site.
And he bade Isabel increase the output of bricks, setting aside a portion for his own use.
For it was his design to turn that ruined hamlet beside the Troll-woods into a stronghold: a place to train soldiers, to store food, and to prepare for the great work that lay ahead.