“Steel-Tongue” is the Passage Lands name for people who facilitate trades and the fiscal growth of their faction. They function as localized currency evaluators and are essential to the economic stability of the country. 

Steel-Tongues are considered the successors to Pre-Burnout financial traders and bankers. Their value isn’t in their number-crunching ability, but how well they understand the market and their ability to make risky decisions with limited information. The vast majority of Steel-Tongues operate within the Passage Lands. 

In the absence of standardized currency, all exchange of goods and services is done through trade. The deals that Steel-Tongues make revolve around exchange rates between different kinds of resources. Their trade has an almost cult-worship of “Rates”, and many Steel-Tongues have been known to go to extreme lengths to find the proper one. 

There are two major considerations for their job:

• Procuring necessities. Steel-Tongues are the people who make sure their faction has everything it needs to keep operating. They trade for food, fuel, raw resources that their faction processes, ammunition, access to trade routes. They also manage any taxes that might be imposed.
• “Angling” for growth. This is normally done in conjunction with the faction’s political leaders. “Growth” is described as the faction’s long-term projects: new facilities, equipment, kinds of personnel, increasing another faction’s dependency, decreasing competition. For example: the high-command of a faction determines that it’s in their interest to start growing apples, their steel-tongues then facilitate trades with the intent to purchase/attract horticulturalists, fertilizers, processing equipment, and the manpower needed to control the land required for the orchards. In the absence of a specific project, Steel-Tongues will then try to exchange surplus resources for more valuable or easily liquidated ones. 

The integration of a Steel-Tongue to their faction varies greatly. In some structures, they are a central figure who dispatches underlings to retrieve information; other times, they are on the front-lines, personally making deals at festivals and in warzones. Here are some examples:

• “Sleeper-Tongues”. Steel-Tongues who pose as ordinary laborers to covertly extract information. Often, a crew-mate with good memory and people-skills is tapped by a senior Steel-Tongue and offered this position. Most of their work is keeping an ear open for specific figures and exchange rates.
  • “Tongue-&-Molars” A more brutish variant involves a Sleeper-Tongue and companions who target rival Steel-Tongues and force information out of them.
• “Wagging-Companies” Steel-Tongues from clusters of small factions will join together to form a “Wagging-Company” and go on expeditions together. They will be gone for weeks at a time, hopping between trading-posts and convoys on the hunt for good rates. Most of these companies are local, but they are sometimes joined by representatives from more powerful groups. 
• “Steely-Consults” In the absence of a designated Steel-Tongue (either intentional or due to rarity), crews will pool their knowledge of available resources and rates to make decisions in a Steely-Consult. A sound tactic, but not as effective as having an actual Steel-Tongue.

While there are a handful of Steel-Tongues who have studied out East, most are mentored by elders or learn as they go. Many young intellectuals view becoming a Steel-Tongue as a way to increase their personal freedom while providing a valuable service to their faction. Steel-Tongues travel frequently and mingle with representatives from other groups. Furthermore, a clever trade can save lives that would otherwise be spent obtaining resources through bloodshed. 

Even with these services, Steel-Tongues are treated as contentious figures. Other people in their factions, who survive through manual labor or fighting, view Steel-Tongues as self-serving and corruptible. This perception is molded through indoctrination against Pre-Burnout fiscal systems and several incidents of prominent Steel-Tongues hoarding resources and abandoning their factions. Pre-Burnout fiscal systems and several incidents of prominent Steel-Tongues hoarding resources and abandoning their factions.