This was not to say that the city was a lawless free-for-all…quite the contrary.  There was order and law, and the governor enforced both with an iron fist.  This troubling thought pulled the rogue out of his daydreaming, and he finished his beer with a frown on his face, losing his appetite for the rest of his lunch, which he left on the edge of the fountain.  He decided to put in another hour, and trundled his pushcart back into the tide of people.  “Household goods!  One-of-a-kind items!  Gently-used garments!”
            He had time before he needed to be at his next destination, was now bored, and his heart was no longer into being Michelo the Peddler.  He quickly took to daydreaming again, slowly pushing his cart in big, lazy circles around the piazza, no longer calling out to customers.  He looked at the people and the buildings.
            It was an old city, and the stone foundations of the architecture reflected its fortress nature.  More modern structures of dark beams and white & yellow plaster had risen on the stones.  Since living outside the walls was an invitation to destruction and thus unthinkable, the population had outgrown the limited space and so had spread the only direction it could…upwards.  There were few buildings shorter than three stories, and many as high as five or six, with steeply-pitched roofs of shingles, tile or copper plates.  Stone towers were still popular, and these climbed even higher.  The outer walls averaged 30’, were topped with heavy battlements and interspersed with reinforced structures, towers and small keeps.  There were three gates, all heavily fortified and well-defended.
            Due to a premium on space and the height of the buildings, streets were generally narrow and almost always in shade.  In many places, upper floors had been built out over the streets, and at times windows were so close to one another across the lanes below that people could shake hands with their neighbor across the way.  Streets were all cobbled, and most of the city had oil-fueled lamp posts attended by Lampners in the employ of the city.  Such close conditions would breed filth and disease in most places, but Eldred’s Cross had two blessings which prevented this; the first was a near-constant breeze from the Inner Sea which kept the air fresh and blew away the smoke from hundreds of chimneys, cooking fires and forges.  The second was a subterranean sewer system so well-designed and constructed that it was the envy of the Imperium.  Waste was carried to sea, and most citizens enjoyed the comforts of clean, indoor privies.  Mouse personally did not, but it was something he looked forward to once he could afford to improve his choice of residence.  Some of the better locations, and all the noble residences, were also served by plumbing from artesian wells, drawing water up into the building, an advancement to rival the

Capital.  Most citizens, however, did not have this level of sophisticated plumbing and relied on wells, the services of water-carriers, and public fountains like the one in this piazza.
            The city, like most heavily populated areas, did have a waste problem (as well as a hefty rat population) and trash was regularly swept into the sea.  This trash dumping and the fact that the sewers emptied into the waterways made the harbors filthy and completely unfit for swimming or fishing, though Mouse personally knew at least three unscrupulous fishermen who still hauled in a bounty from the polluted waters, packing the sickly fish in barrels of salt and selling it to the army or those not in-the-know.  The city smelled of salt and the sea. During the day the streets were crowded… vendors, citizens going about their business, trade wagons and carts moving goods, laborers off-loading ships and hauling their wares to other destinations, animals of all sorts, bodies of troops marching to the staging area and barracks, criers, beggars, sailors, couriers, shoppers, children, peddlers, noblemen, carriages, horsemen, drovers, Watchmen, pickpockets… all this humanity packed tightly together.  At night most citizens were at home, and the moonlit streets were occupied by lampners, street-sweepers, watchmen, drunks, rowdy youths, a few die-hard peddlers, prostitutes and cutthroats.
            “My neighbors,” Mouse muttered to himself.  A woman asked the price of a faded blue dress, then snorted and left when he told her.  Good, he thought, it wouldn’t have fit you anyway.  He continued his slow circle.  Was it eleven yet?  He didn’t want to arrive too early, might get noticed.  Better to get there a little late and blend with the crowd.  His cart rattled on.

For the honest, above-board residents (of whom Mouse did not count himself,) Citizenship in Eldred’s Cross was granted to those who owned property.  This entitled them to pay annual taxes, but allowed them to avoid the entry fee at the gates.  It also put them at the front of the line ahead of immigrants and visitors at certain restaurants and fine shops, and preferred service with doctors, craftsmen and builders.  Citizenship was demonstrated by showing a lacquered wooden chit with their name and the city crest burned into it… an object frequently counterfeited, and available almost everywhere for 10gp.  Mouse owned several himself, two of which were right here in his pushcart.