Iorich (27 page)

Oh.

Well, sure. That would do it.

“You think, Boss?”

“Why not? What would happen?”

“I don’t know. You figure that out.”

“I already have, Loiosh. The investigation would be stopped, at least for a while, and there would be all sorts of noise about rounding up and suppressing Teckla and Easterners, and the nobles would
blame Zerika for letting it get out of hand, and it would be a round throw whether she’d be able to get things back in hand, or whether she’d have to cave to the Jhereg to get the pressure off.”

“That’s the part I don’t see, Boss. How does going along with the Jhereg relieve the pressure on Zerika?”

“Now that is an excellent question, my fine jhereg friend. I think I’ll go ask her.”

“Now?”

“I’ll probably have to wait for hours to see her; can you think of a reason not to start the wait?”

“Put that way, I guess not.”

It was early evening; just beginning to get dark. I didn’t know what hours Her Majesty kept, but it could do no harm in asking, so long as no one polished me up during the walk from the inn to the Palace.

Loiosh and Rocza kept careful watch, and I took the roundabout path I’d taken before, and made it to the Palace without incident. I won’t bore you with a repetition of making my way to Asskiss Alley. Harnwood was still there; like Aliera, he seemed not to have moved.

“Count Szurke,” he said.

I bowed. “Good Lord Harnwood, would it be possible to find out if Her Majesty would consent to see me?”

His face gave no sign there was anything odd in the request. “Is it urgent?”

“A few hours or a day will make no difference,” I said. “But I have new information.”

He didn’t ask about what. Maybe he knew, but more likely he knew it was none of his business. “I shall inquire. Please have a chair.”

I did, and waited maybe half an hour.

“The Empress will see you.”

I started to follow him, stopped, and said, “When backing away from Her Majesty at the end of the interview, how many steps do I take before turning around?”

He smiled; I think the question pleased him. “If you are here as a personal friend of Her Majesty, then five. If you are here as Count Szurke, then seven. If as Baronet Taltos, then ten.”

“Thank you,” I said.

If I had the choice between trying to figure out an Issola and trying to figure out an Iorich, I think I’d take a nap.

Harnwood led me through a different route, shorter, and to a cozier room; I had the strong feeling this was a part of her living quarters, which meant I was being honored, or else that I was irritating her, or both. She was waiting. Harnwood bowed deeply to Her Majesty, less deeply to me. I bowed to Her Majesty, she nodded to me. It’s just like a dance.

She didn’t offer me a chair. I said, “Majesty, thank you for seeing me. I hadn’t realized you knew the Necromancer.”

She frowned. “How did you—” then looked down at her golden outfit. “You’ve seen Sethra recently.”

“Your Majesty’s powers of deduction are—”

“Leave it. What is this new information?”

“There is going to be an effort made to stop the investigation into the events in Tirma.”

She frowned. “What sort of attempt, and how do you know?”

I nodded. “Please accept my compliments, Majesty. Those are good questions. I recognize good questions, because I can come up with them myself.”

Her brows came together. “Are you bargaining with me, Taltos?”

“No, Majesty. I’ll answer yours in any case. I’m hoping Your Majesty’s gratitude will—”

“I get it. I’ll think about it.”

Being Empress means being able to interrupt anyone, at any time. Lady Teldra wouldn’t have approved, but I have to admit it was the first thing about the job I’d ever found attractive.

I said, “An attempt will be made on the life of Justicer Desaniek. I know by deduction, from hints I’ve gotten, and because I know how the Jhereg operates.”

She stared. “The Jhereg? They wouldn’t—”

“It will look like an attempt by a group of Easterners and Teckla; one of those outfits of political malcontents. It will be very convincing.”

She sat back and her eyes half closed. The Orb slowed down over her head, and turned purple. I’d never seen it slow down before. I wondered what it meant. After about a minute, she looked up at me. “What are your questions, Taltos?”

“Just one: Why would they do it?”

“Eh?”

“I know about their attempt to get you to pass decrees outlawing certain chemicals—”

“How do you know that?”

I answered the question she wanted answered, not what she’d asked. I said, “From the Jhereg side, Majesty, not from anyone to whom you entrusted the knowledge.”

“Very well.”

“As I said, I know about that. And I understand that Your Majesty—”

“Forget the formal speech, Taltos. I’m too tired and too irritated.”

The Orb had, indeed, turned icy blue. I bowed slightly and said, “I understand you’re trying to break out of the trap by bringing the truth out about the events in Tirma, and I admire that. But I don’t understand the other side of it. That is, how it is that if you cooperate with the Jhereg, make the decrees they want and all that—how does that take the pressure off you?”

She was quiet for a long time; the Orb gradually changing from blue to a non-descript green. “My first duty,” she said slowly, “is to keep the Empire running. If I fail in that, nothing else matters. To run the Empire, I need the cooperation of all of those I can’t coerce, and to coerce those who won’t cooperate. To do that, I need the confidence of the nobles and the princes. If I lose the confidence of the nobles, of the princes, I cannot run the Empire.”

“Sounds pretty simple. Can the Jhereg really cause the nobles and princes to lose confidence in you?”

“A week ago I thought they could. Now—” She shrugged. “Now I guess we’ll put it to the test.”

I bowed to her, backed up seven steps, and left.

Caltho—I understand Henish has refused to testify officially. I don’t think that will be a problem, but if we’re going to do this, we need to know what he knows. Can you speak with him informally and find out just what happened? Let him know we aren’t out to stick a knife in him, we just need to know, from his point of view, what the sequence was. In particular, try to ascertain:

 

1. Did the troops have reason to believe the peasants in that shack were working with the enemy?

2. Did the peasants do anything that looked like it may have been an attack, or preparation for an attack?

3. Were they questioned, and, if so, how did they respond?

4. Did the troops see any weapons or anything that looked like it could be used as a weapon?

5. Did they violate orders, and, if so, at what point did they deviate from orders or expected procedures?

 

Let him know that if we can get straight answers to these questions, even unofficially, I’m pretty sure we can put this thing away, whatever the answers are.

—Desaniek (not authenticated)

How do you stop an assassin?

Sounds like it’s about to be a joke, doesn’t it? But no, I was really asking myself that.

You’d think, what with me having been one for a big chunk of my life, I’d have some pretty good ideas on how to go about stopping one, but it doesn’t work that way. When I thought up a way that would have stopped me, I thought up a way to counter it.

The point is, most assassins I know work pretty much the same way: get the pattern of your target’s movements, select a spot, pick a time, make an escape plan, choose a method, then, well, you do it. If you want to stop the assassin, and you don’t know who it is, you need to do pretty much the same thing and be there first. Good luck with that.

Or else—hmmm—maybe find the assassin while he’s setting it up? Yeah, that had some possibilities.

“Well, Loiosh? Got any better ideas?”

“Your job is to find better ideas, mine is to cut holes in the ones you have, and you’ve already done that pretty well.”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

I wandered around the Imperial Wing until I found a refreshingly snobbish Teckla who, for a bit of silver, was willing to guide us to the office of the Imperial Justicer. Loiosh and Rocza hid inside my cloak, which I should mention isn’t terribly
comfortable for any of us at the best of times, and with the added weight on my shoulders (literally) now was flat no fun at all.

I was just as glad to have a guide—I’d never have been able to find it on my own. I made a point of noting the twists, turns, and stairways, and when we got there (“Down this hall, the double doors with the iorich below the Imperial Phoenix there, you see, and the gold knobs? That one.”) I didn’t think I’d ever be able to find it again.

I dismissed the Teckla and walked into the office, which was damn near as big as the throne room, and much more tastefully appointed, gold knobs notwithstanding. A pleasant-looking gentleman with eyebrows that looked like he trimmed them sat behind a large highly polished desk and inquired as to my business, showing no signs of discomfort at being polite to me. I said, “I beg your pardon, m’lord, I’m in the wrong place.” I bowed low and humbly, as befit an Easterner, and walked out.

There was no one outside the office, so I took a good, slow look around. I was at the end of a long, wide hallway; with no other doors to the place, the insides probably wrapped around, with a bunch of internal offices, and also probably went quite a ways back beyond what I saw. There had been no windows in the room I was in.

Being at the end of the hallway like that was bad, because there was no place to hide, but good because it meant there was no other way out—unless there was a direct exit. I should have had Kiera steal the plans for the Palace, if there were any, and if I could have found a Vallista to interpret them for me. Wide hallways mean important people in the Palace, and maybe other places too. I’ll make no comment on gold doorknobs; you decide.

It was marginal whether this would be a good place to find Desaniek; someone important is liable to have another entrance or two, but not likely to use it most of the time; this is because they usually want to be seen coming and going, and to check on those who work for them. Not always, but chances were good she’d be coming out this way.

At the other extreme of the hall—that is, past the stairway—were three rooms and a small, short passage ending in a door. I went and clapped at it—which hurt all through my chest and neck—and no one answered; tried the door and it was locked. I didn’t feel like being caught picking a lock in the Imperial Palace, so I didn’t.

I hate it when there’s no good place to hide; especially when I’m standing around somewhere I obviously don’t belong. Here is where an invisibility spell would have been useful, if I’d been able to cast one without removing my protections, and if casting it wouldn’t have set off every alarm in the Palace.

Yeah, well.

The ceiling provided no good place for Loiosh to hide, either.

“I beg to differ.”

“The hanging lamp? You think you can use that?”

“I’d be concealed from one direction, and in shadows from the other.”

“You know what would happen if you were spotted? A jhereg in the Palace? Someone would scream, and they’d run and get everybody and—”

“Maybe they’d just shoo me out the nearest window.”

“I wouldn’t bet on it. And you won’t be able to follow her without being spotted. And whenever you leave, it’ll be problematical.”

“Rocza will do it. All she has to do is let me know when she leaves, and which direction she goes. And she can stay here until we can fetch her.”