Elpaloz Customhouse

Elpaloz Customhouse is the headquarters of the Commercial Guilds in the city of Elpaloz on the northwestern coast of the Sea of Jars. The building has long constituted something of a fault line in the political culture of the city, a capacity which makes it of particular interest to thaumatologists.

Location

Elpaloz Customhouse is unusual among its type in the Eleven Cities in that it is located in the city's northern environs, on the opposite side of town from the wharf district where the Commercial Guilds generally construct the large majority of their business. This oddity is not an accident. The cult of Zargyod was active in pre-Wesmodian Elpaloz, having evidently arrived in the city in the hearts of sailors from Oluz and Halumay, whose trade links with Elapaloz pre-date clearly-defined history. In these northern cities Zargyod was generally revered as a deity of the sea, and that capacity is clear in the inscriptions - most of them much-deteriorated, fragmentary and only apparent to the informed eye - which indicate the former existence of several small shrines to him around the Elpalozian waterfront. Such shrines endured as the cult's sole infrastructural presence in the city until the temple was constructed in the mid-second century BWR.
The unusual location befits a structure built during the period in which the Chogyan Hegemony had effective control over Elpaloz. In Chogyos Zargyod was associated with concepts of wealth and good fortune much more strongly than he was with the sea. Chogyan cultural influence over Elapaloz saw a sailor's cult gradually become one of merchants and bureaucrats whose connection to the sea was purely as a means to an end. It has been speculated - without much specific evidence - that Elpaloz probably remained a hotbed of the shipboard cult of Zargyod as observed by Sailors on the Sea of Jars, but on land his relevance and reverence increasingly followed Chogyan patterns. This is most obviously demonstrated by the fact that the building follows obviously Chogyan models, being in many respects a scaled-down reproduction of the temple structure in the Chogyos Customhouse. The structure is thus a relic of a period of history that many residents of the city would prefer to forget, and were it not for the power and influence the Commercial Guilds exercise in the city it would likely have been torn down some time ago.

Facilities

Elpaloz Customhouse is, by deliberate design, something of a replica of the larger Customhouse complex in Chogyos. Ovular in shape, it is roughly three-quarters the size of its southern model and situated on a substantial garden estate patrolled by an equally substantial staff of guards. Indentured labourers - officially Guilders of Lead status - maintain the gardens. The southern seaward side of the building is an open collonade (again, heavily guarded) and the floor is made of ginger-coloured sandstone quarried from outside the city, very fashionable at the time of construction and considerably less so now - but scrupulously maintained by the occupants, who augmented it with brass grouting less than a decade ago. A large mosaic depicting the story of Zargyod and the Sailors adorns the inner wall.
Merchants are invited to use this space to negotiate and settle business dealings and ventures, while Copper Guilders circulate making introductions and offering expert advice. Another building in the same set of gardens houses an archive where written business contracts can be drafted, notarised and deposited for safekeeping, presided over by a triumvirate of Copper Guilders and a substantial staff of Iron subalterns. Also in the gardens is a building full of private suites for those who wish to discuss business away from prying eyes, a block of flats for the Copper Guilders, a long dormitory-like building for those of lower rank, and a stronghouse where visitors may deposit money and, if they present a strong enough case, borrow it from the Guilds themselves. This last building sees a lot of use; the lending of money and charging of interest on loans is a much larger part of the Guilds' business in Elpaloz than in most other cities. Precisely where the resulting wealth is stored is a closely-guarded secret; deposits are spirited away very quickly and loans presented to the receiver in the central discussion hall, where the munificence of the Guilders can be leveraged for political ends.
The Guilders also own a large proportion of the warehouses in Elpaloz's wharf district, where they keep wares they themselves import or export and rent out excess space to independent merchants. A small but well-appointed suite of offices exists in a building not far from the waterfront where this side of the business is administered by a Copper Guilder who wears a specific chain of office denoting their institutional role.

Institutional structure and purpose

Elpaloz Customhouse is structurally orthodox, being headed by a Gold Guilder who is assisted by two Silver Guilders, who run a staff of around a dozen Copper Guilders, who head most of the day-to-day operations of the organisation as well as running a substantial complement of lesser-ranked members.
As with most such institutions the Customhouse is chiefly concerned with facilitating and promoting inter-city trade. Most of the major trade deals that happen in the city are brokered in the Customhouse with the full co-operation, and sometimes active instigation, of the Guilders. They finance their operations by levying fees and duties on such trade, and also by charging interests on loans used to finance such operations. These fees, and the interest on the loans, are no higher in Elpaloz than they are in most other cities. The centrality of Guild financing of the trade on which the city depends has led, however, to a degree of ill feeling towards the Guilders from many of the city's movers and shakers, most of whom are involved in maritime commerce and indebted in some way or other the Customhouse. Given the extent to which the Elpaloz Customhouse mirrors that of Chogyos, both visually and in terms of institutional practice, it is often seen as a relic of Chogyan power in the city, harking back to the era of the Chogyan Hegemony which many in Elpaloz would prefer to forget.