Florence, Early 1501
Elias returned to Florence not as a boy who had traveled, but as a man who had left something behind.
Marco Vitale now lived in Rome. And the world—unaware—had just acquired its most disciplined ghost.
But Elias was not content to simply plant seeds in the dark. A gardener must also test his soil.
And that meant control.
---
He began with salted cod.
A stable, dull trade good. Imported from the Portuguese coast, it arrived monthly in Florence through merchant syndicates. It was not fashionable. It was not volatile.
Perfect.
Elias fed a rumour through Vincenzo: that the next shipment of cod, destined for the Lent markets, had spoiled in Livorno's port. He gave the man two coins to pass it along to a spice merchant, who passed it along to a fishmonger, who repeated it at a tavern, where it quickly spread to ten city blocks in a day.
Elias waited.
By week's end, demand for existing cod in the city doubled. Luca's competitor, Master Brunetti, sold off nearly his entire reserve within two days.
Then, Elias had Vincenzo pass along another whisper—that the guild in Pisa had rerouted an extra shipment, fresh and clean.
Suddenly, prices dropped again. Those who bought high were left holding barrels.
Elias bought some of that surplus cod through a dummy buyer, at a third of the price.
Three days later, the Lent announcement came from the local church.
Demand surged.
Prices rose again.
Elias sold.
He made thirty-seven Florins. Quietly. Cleanly. No one asked questions. No one noticed a child's hand in it.
But he noticed something more important:
Whispers made money.
---
That night, Elias sat alone with a candle and began drawing his first influence web.
He didn't write names.
He drew roles:
Rumor originator.
First spreader.
Market listener.
Price manipulator.
Exit point.
It was a flowchart of the invisible. The beginning of a system that would someday span nations and currencies.
Not yet. But someday.
---
Luca noticed the change.
"You've been quiet," he said one evening, sipping hot wine. "Not like before."
"I've been watching more than speaking," Elias replied.
Luca laughed. "That's what a banker does."
"No," Elias said. "That's what a spider does."
Luca stared at him, then chuckled uneasily. "You're full of strange thoughts."
Elias smiled. "Only the true ones."
---
Over the next month, Elias repeated his cod manoeuvre twice—once with cloves and once with olive oil futures. Both required careful messaging, a touch of misdirection, and no direct contact.
The trick, he learned, wasn't just supply.
It was the perception of scarcity.
People didn't act on the truth. They acted on fear.
And fear was free to manufacture.
---
By spring, Elias had amassed seventy Florins across several hidden caches—one under his floorboard, one hidden behind a broken tile at the family vineyard, and another delivered to Rome under Marco Vitale's name.
It wasn't enough to matter yet.
But it was proof of concept.
---
His final test was social.
He arranged for a minor noble's servant—one who had gossiped about his master's mistress—to be transferred into a rival household.
Elias used only one letter, sent by a "concerned cousin," planted with a wine merchant's courier.
Two weeks later, the servant was gone. The noble's household weakened. The rival's influence rose.
And no one saw Elias.
Not once.
---
He now had five tools:
A name in Rome.
An agent in Florence.
A source of coin.
A system of rumours.
And proof that markets bent to suggestion.
He was ready to expand.
But not in Florence.
It was time to send Marco Vitale east—to Venice.
The city of secrets. The city of trade.
The place where real fortunes moved like tides.