Scintilla - Trade within Hive Tarsus: Hive Tarsus manufactures very little. Instead, its middle hive is dominated by the Goldenhand, a vast complex of trading halls and auction houses held like a great golden nugget in the heart of Tarsus' city-web. The Goldenhand houses a massive, infinitely complex financial market where commodities are bought and sold at a dizzying rate, and enormous amounts of thrones and goods change hands hourly.Traders representing both planetary and sector-wide merchant houses buy, sell and try to swindle each other. The Goldenhand never shuts and is constantly thronged with people yelling out offers and curses in a complicated trader's code called "Goldentongue." Most traders are accompanied by armed bodyguards, since the application of violence or even assassination are recognised tactics for gaining the upper hand. Activity in the Goldenhand is extremely intense, with few who work there lasting very long before they are burned out. Many is the man who has lost a fortune for his noble patrons in the Goldenhand and chosen to walk to certain death into the desert to do penance for his failures.Activity in the Goldenhand is regulated by two bodies. The first is the Goldenhand's own staff of auction masters and functionaries; dressed in browns and brass, their faces painted deep gold, they look appropriately enough like a part of the Goldenhand itself. The second group is the Administratum. The adepts of the Administratum's Goldenhand Consular Taskforce (under the leadership of the energetic and surprisingly good-humoured Consul Sevavin) forms the largest concentration of adepts on Scintilla and probably in the whole Calixis Sector.They are a familiar sight in their stark grey uniforms, contrasting with the outlandish fashions of the various noble traders, and are never jostled or threatened as they go about their business. The adepts are considered above the violence that flourishes between the other traders, partly because they represent the interests of the God-Emperor, but mainly because they have the very best protection in the form of veteran Astra Militarum soldiers from the Death World of Mortressa. The adepts' purpose in the Goldenhand is to ensure that the tithes handed over to the Administratum from the hives of Scintilla do not consist of inferior goods with inflated values, and to maintain awareness of all the major deals going on among the planet's noble houses.Another important player is House Krin, one of the great sector-wide noble houses, which revels in its reputation as "Drusus' bankers" and can arrange banking and massive loans to anyone confident that they can pay up when the time comes. The adepts of the Administratum are based in a building of gold and glass suspended over the Goldenhand's largest trading hall, while House Krin's household security troops protect the family's complex of vaults and safe rooms just beneath the Goldenhand.Hive Tarsus' trade dominance is due to the fact that the planet's orbital docks are geostationary above the hive. It is said that Tarsus is the "lungs and stomach" of Scintilla. Vast wharfs and warehousing/handling vaults dominate the middle hive, pulsing with the import and export of goods. There are said to be chambers the size of cathedrals in the dense heart of Hive Tarsus, packed with crated goods never claimed or shifted.