Rewrite That Witch
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Chapter 253: Hot Air Balloon Trade

“Your Royal Highness,” Hogg said, his voice lowered to something between curiosity and reverence, “the painting behind the lord’s seat — no ordinary artist could have done that. Not the accuracy, and certainly not the aerial perspective.” He glanced around the hall with new eyes, taking in the way the mural seemed to breathe. “Is that a witch’s work?”

Roland looked at Margaret. She gave a small nod — he’s trustworthy.

“It is,” Roland said. The mural had come out of the balloon flight two days prior: the southern coastline spread out below them, the mountains folding toward the sea, the sky wide and pale at the edges. He had wanted to keep it. The hall’s previous décor had been the bare stone of neglect, and Soraya had transformed the wall behind the lord’s seat into something that made visitors stop walking when they entered. “A witch painted it.”

Hogg let out a long, admiring breath. “Propagated as devil’s servants, and yet — to fly up there and come back and paint that.” He shook his head. “An ordinary person could never manage it.”

“You’re only half right,” Roland said. “The ordinary person couldn’t paint it. But the flying — that’s another matter. Ordinary people can fly. Higher than eagles. Faster than swifts.”

Hogg laughed with the easy warmth of a man who appreciated a joke. “Only if we grew wings. And weighed less than a sparrow.”

Margaret had gone very still. “You’re serious.”

“I am,” Roland said, “and I can prove it.”

Cloud Gazer was still inflated in the courtyard. Within the hour, Roland had assembled a second test flight. The witches who had missed the first navigation crowded in alongside the merchants; Lucia asked quietly whether her younger sister could come, and Roland said yes without hesitation. Bell, too small to see over the rim, ended up on Lucia’s shoulders — the girl braced against the basket wall and warned her firmly, in the tone of someone who had been warned that way themselves, not to fidget. Lightning circled the balloon throughout the flight, stopping occasionally to make faces at Bell from the outside air.

Cloud Gazer traced the southern coastline. The mountains shrank below them. The sea opened out, its blue acquiring depth and curvature at the horizon — a fact of physics made visible, the world bending gently away beneath them in all directions.

When they landed, Hogg stood in the courtyard with both hands gripping the basket rail for another minute, unwilling to let go. “I never thought,” he said at last, with the half-shattered expression of someone who had expected the world to stay where he’d left it, “that looking down from that height would feel like falling. Even while standing still.”

“It passes,” Roland said. “The first time you leave the ground it always plays tricks with you. The same way the sea does, the first time it moves under you.”

“The edge of the sea.” Margaret’s voice was hushed. “It looked curved. Like a blue arc.” She paused. “I had heard this, but I had never understood it.”

Hogg recovered enough to pour himself a cup of iced liquor and drain it. “Your Royal Highness — I’ll grant you the point. An ordinary person can fly. But the balloon itself still needs a witch to heat the air, doesn’t it? Without them it’s just a very large bag.”

“You’re right that Miss Anna provided the heat,” Margaret said, before Roland could speak. She had been thinking through it as she flew — he could see that now. “But she was releasing flame, nothing more. I asked Lightning: as long as enough heat goes into the airbag, Cloud Gazer will rise. Flame itself is not a witch’s privilege.” She turned to Roland. “Is that right?”

He smiled. “Hot air rises. Cold air sinks. That’s why it’s called a hot air balloon.”

“Could a brazier do it?” Hogg asked.

“Not as it stands. To keep the balloon aloft, you need continuous heat — and wood is too heavy to carry in unlimited quantity. The fuel problem needs a different solution.”

“Can you solve it?” Margaret asked.

“I believe so. There are some difficulties to work through, but—” He paused, letting the hesitation read as genuine. “I think it’s manageable.”

“Then I want four or five,” Margaret said immediately. “They don’t need to be this large — one person would be sufficient.”

Hogg looked at her. “You want them on your ships.”

“A mast can only reach so high. But a balloon tethered to the mast can go as high as the rope allows — and it won’t drift away, as long as it stays connected. Imagine the lookout advantage. The biggest threat to a merchant fleet, after storms and shoals, is pirates. If you can see them before they see you—” She spread her hands, the gesture completing the argument.

Roland ran the numbers in his head. Without a witch to heat the air, the balloon needed fuel — coal gas, the most accessible option, but Graycastle’s coal mines sat in the Cold-Wind Mountain Range, too remote to supply Border Town under current logistics. Hydrogen was simpler to produce through water electrolysis; the main obstacle was the gas canister, and a balloon with no dependable refill infrastructure was merely an expensive curiosity. Either way: real engineering costs, real production time, real materials.

He inflated his estimate generously. “More than a thousand gold royals per unit, I would think.”

Margaret did not blink. “If you can actually produce it — one thousand gold royals, fixed price — I can promise you every caravan sailing out of the Fjords will want at least one or two.”

Hogg raised his cup in something between a toast and a lament. “Crescent Moon Bay wasn’t in this convoy, otherwise you’d have your second large order already tonight. As for me — magical as it all is, my Silver City mines have no use for balloons. I need those steam engines.”

Roland held his expression still while he processed Margaret’s acceptance. A thousand gold royals was five times his estimated production cost. He had expected negotiation, pushback, perhaps a counteroffer at half that figure. But when he considered what a merchant ship carrying a full cargo actually represented — the goods, the lives of the crew, the accumulated investment of an entire season at sea — a thousand gold royals to reliably spot a pirate fleet before it reached attack range was not extravagant. It was prudent.

And a thousand gold royals per unit was only the beginning. Hydrogen or coal gas were both consumables. When the balloon ran dry, the merchant would return to Border Town for a refill — and a refill implied a service contract, a supply relationship, a form of recurring revenue that would outlast the initial sale. He could offer discounts for bulk canister purchases. He could offer a set number of free inflations with each unit sold. The model was older than this world, in its essentials: sell the machine, then sell everything it runs on.

Roland let himself pause for a count of three — the correct interval for a man reconsidering a position — then nodded. “Then I think we have a deal.”

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