Provided directly from an uncorrected manuscript of
The Republic of Thieves
for the reading pleasure of a certain group of people.
All contects Copyright 2010, Scott Lynch
This file may be passed from interested reader to interested reader, but may not be a) made avaialble in any public place save Camorr.com or b) transcribed and placed online in any other format or context. Violators of these rather tame stipulations will be flayed alive by methamphetamine-addled lemurs armed with chainsaws. Don't ask where my publishers get the money for stuff like that. 

-SL

*****

Chapter One
THINGS GET WORSE

1

	Weak sunlight against his eyelids was enough to draw him out of sleep. He blinked, squinting against the intruding brightness. The window was open, letting in mild afternoon air and a faint fresh-water smell. Not Camorr. Waves lapping against a sand beach. . . no, not Camorr at all. 
	He was tangled in his sheets again. His head was light, and the roof of his mouth felt like sun-dried leather. The chapped skin of his lips peeled apart as he opened his mouth to croak, “What are you. . .“
	“Shhhh. I didn’t mean to wake you. The room needed a bit of air.“ A dark blur on the left, more or less Jean’s height. The floor creaked as the shape moved about. Soft rustle of fabric, snap of a coin purse, clink of metal. Locke pushed himself up on his elbows, accepting the dizziness as it came.   
	“I was. . . it was her, I was dreaming about her. The times that we. . . when we first met.“
	“Her?”
	“Her. You know.”
	“The one and only her?” 	“Of course.” Jean knelt beside the bed and held out a cup of water, which Locke took in his shaking left hand and sipped at gratefully. The world was coming into focus. “So vivid. Thought I could. . . touch her. Tell her. . . sorry I am.“
	“That’s the best you can manage? Dreaming of a woman like that, and the best you can think to do with your time is apologize?”
	“Hardly under my control—”
	“They’re your dreams. Take the reins.“ 
	“I was. . . just a little boy, for the gods’ sakes.” 
	“If she pops up again just move it forward ten or fifteen years. I want to see some blushing and stammering next time you wake up.”
	“Going somewhere?“
	“Out for a bit. Making my rounds.“
	“Jean, there’s no point. . . quit torturing yourself, and just—”
	“Finished?“ Jean took the cup back from him, rose, and set it down on a nearby table. 
	“Not nearly. I—”
	“I won’t be gone long.“ Jean gave the lapels of his coat a perfunctory brushing before he moved to the door. “Get some more rest.“
	“You just don't listen to reason, do you?"
	"I do try to honor your terrible example."
	The door slid shut and Jean was gone, out into the streets of Lashain.

2

	Lashain was famous as a city where anything could be bought and, more importantly, anything could be left behind. By the grace of the regio, the city’s highest and thinnest order of nobility (where a title that could be traced back more than two generations qualified one for the old guard), just about anyone with cash in hand and enough of a pulse to maintain semi-consciousness could have their blood transmuted to a reasonable facsimile of blue.
	From every corner of the Therin world they came-- merchants and criminals, mercenary captains and pirates, gamblers and adventurers and exiles. As commoners they entered the chrysalis of a counting-house, shed vast quantities of precious metal, and as newborn peers of Lashain they emerged into the daylight. Demibarons, barons, viscounts, counts, and even the occasional marquis, with styles largely of their own invention. Their honors were taken from a list and cost extra—“Defender of the Twelvefold Faith“ was quite popular. There were also half a dozen meaningless orders of knighthood that looked marvelous on a coat lapel.  
	Because of the novelty of this purchased respectability to those who brokered it for themselves, Lashain was the most violently manners-conscious city Jean Tannen had ever visited. Lacking centuries of aristocratic descent to assure them of their worth, the neophytes of Lashain overcompensated with ceremony. Their rules of precedence were like alchemical formulae, and dinner parties killed more of them each year than fevers and accidents combined. It seemed that little could be more thrilling for men who’d only just bought their family names than to risk them (not to mention their mortal flesh) over minor insults.
	The record, as far as Jean had heard, was three days from counting-house to dueling green to funeral cart. The regio, of course, offered no refunds to relations of the deceased. 
	As a result of all of this nonsense, it was very difficult for those without titles, regardless of the color of their coin, to gain ready access to the best physikers Lashain had to offer. They were made such status symbols by their titled clients that they rarely had to scamper after gold from other sources.
	The taste of autumn was in the cool wind blowing off the Amathel, the Lake of Jewels, the freshwater sea that spread from horizon to horizon north of Lashain. Jean was moderately dressed by Lashani standards, in a brown velvet frock coat and a collection of silks worth no more than eight or nine gold Lashani santi. This marked him instantly as someone’s man. Ironically, the extra respect a tenfold increase in the value of his clothes would have bought would also have been useless for his current task, since no gentlemen of consequence did his own waiting at a physiker’s garden gate. 
	Scholar Erkemar Zodesti was widely regarded as the finest physiker in Lashain, a prodigy with the bone saw and the alchemist's crucible. He‘d also shown complete disinterest, for three days straight, in Jean’s requests for a consultation. 
	Today Jean once again approached the iron-barred gate at the rear of Zodesti's garden, from behind which an elderly servant peered at him with reptilian insolence. In Jean’s outstretched hands were a pair of parchment envelopes and a small square of white card. Just like the day before, and the day before that, and the day before that. Jean was getting testy.   
	The servant reached out between the bars, took everything Jean offered without a word, and began examining it. The smaller envelope, containing the customary gratuity of (far too many) silver coins vanished into the servant’s coat in an instant. The old man read the inscription on the white card, raised his eyebrows at Jean, and walked away into the garden.
	The card said exactly what it always did— Contempla va cora frata eminenza. “Consider the request of an eminent friend,“ in the Throne Therin that was the polite affectation for this sort of gesture. Rather than giving an aristocrat’s name, this message meant that someone powerful wished to pay anonymously to have someone else examined. This was a common means of bringing wealth to bear on the problems of, say, a pregnant mistress, without directly compromising the identity of anyone important. 
	Jean passed the long minutes of his wait by examining the physiker’s house. It was a good solid place, about the size of a smaller Alcegrante mansion back home in Camorr. Newer, though, and done up in a mock Tal Verrar style that labored to proclaim the importance of its inhabitants. The roof was tiled with slats of some volcanic glass that gleamed like polished steel, and every door and window was bordered with decorative carvings that would have better suited a temple. 

	From the heart of the garden itself, closed off from Jean’s view by thick hedges hard up against a ten-foot stone wall, he could hear the sounds of a lively party. Clinking glasses, shrieks of laughter, and behind it all the hum of a nine-stringed viol and a few other instruments. 
	“I regret to inform your master that the scholar is unable to accommodate his request for a consultation at this time.“ The servant reappeared behind the iron gate with empty hands. The gold coin in the large envelope, included as a token of earnestness, was of course gone. . . though into the hands of Zodesti or this servant, Jean couldn’t say, and he had no social leverage here to make an accusation.
	“Perhaps you might care to tell me when it would be more convenient for the scholar to receive my master’s request,“ said Jean, “the middle of the afternoon for half a week now being obviously unsuitable.“
	“I fear that I could not say.“ The servant yawned. “The scholar is quite consumed with work at the moment.“
	“With work.“ Jean fumed as the sound of applause drifted from the garden party. “Indeed. My master has a case which requires the greatest possible skill and discretion—“
	“Your master may rely upon the scholar’s discretion at all times,“ said the servant hotly, “unfortunately, his skill is urgently required elsewhere at the moment.“
	“Gods damn you, man!“ Jean's self-control evaporated. “This is important!“
	“I will not be spoken to in a vulgar fashion. Good day.”
	For a moment Jean considered reaching through the iron bars and seizing the old man by the throat, but that would have been counter-productive. He was wearing no fighting leathers under his awkward finery, and his purely decorative shoes would be worse than bare feet in a scuffle. Despite the pair of hatchets tucked away under the back of his coat, he wasn’t equipped to storm even a garden party. 
	“The scholar risks giving offense to a citizen of considerable importance,“ growled Jean.
	“The scholar is giving offense, you simple fellow.” The old man chuckled. “I tell you plainly, the scholar has very little interest in the sort of business arranged in this fashion. I don’t believe a single citizen of any importance is so unfamiliar with the scholar that they need fear to be received by the front door.“
	“I will call again tomorrow,“ said Jean, straining to keep his composure. “Perhaps I might name a sum that will penetrate even your master’s indifference.“
	“You are to be commended for your persistence. Though by whom, I couldn’t possibly say. Tomorrow you must do as your master bids. For now, I have already said good day.“
	“Indeed,“ said Jean. “A good day to you, and may the gods cherish the house wherein such kindness dwells.“ He bowed stiffly, turned, and walked away.

	There was nothing else to be done at the moment, in this gods-damned city where even throwing gold coins was no guarantee of attracting attention to a problem. 
	As he stomped back to his hired carriage, Jean cursed Maxilan Stragos for the thousandth time. The bastard had lied about so much. Why, in the end, had the damned poison been the one thing he’d chosen to tell the truth about?

3

	Home for the time being was a rented suite in the Villa Suvela, an unadorned but scrupulously clean rooming house favored by travelers who came to Lashain to bathe in the waters of the Amathel. Those waters were said to cure rheumatism, though Jean had yet to see a bather come out prancing on their tip-toes after a swim. The rooming house overlooked a black sand beach on the city’s northeast shore, and the other lodgers kept to themselves.
	“The bastard,“ said Jean as he threw open the door to the suite‘s inner apartment. “The motherless Lashani reptile. The greedy son of a piss-bucket and a bad fart.“
	“My keen grasp of subtle nuance tells me you may be frustrated,“ said Locke. He was sitting up, and he looked fully awake.
	“We’ve been snobbed off again,“ said Jean, drawing the door closed behind him, far more carefully. Despite the fresh air from the window the inner apartment still smelled of old sweat and fresh blood, and that smell recalled him immediately to his better manners. “Zodesti won‘t come. Not today at least.”
	“To hell with him then, Jean.“
	“He’s the only physiker of repute I haven’t got to yet. Some of the others were difficult, but he’s being impossible.“
	“I’ve been pinched and bled by every gods-damned lunatic in this city who ever so much as shoved a pill down a throat,“ said Locke. “One more won‘t matter.“
	“He’s the best.“ Jean flung his coat over a chair, set his hatchets down on a table, and removed a bottle of blue wine from a cabinet. “An alchemical expert in a class by himself. A real smirking rat-fucker, too.”
	“Well,” said Locke, “it’s really all for the good, then. What would the neighbors say if I kept company with a man who fornicates with rodents?”
	“We need his opinion.” 	“I’m tired of being a public curiosity,“ said Locke. “If he won’t come, he won’t come. Quit troubling yourself over him.“
	“I’ll call again tomorrow.“ Jean poured two half-glasses of wine and watered them until they were a pleasant afternoon-sky color. “I’ll have the self-important prick here one way or another.“
	“What are you going to do, break his fingers if he won’t consult? Might make things ticklish for me. Especially if he wants to cut something off.“
	“He might have a solution.“
	“Oh, for the gods‘ sake.“ Locke’s frustrated sigh turned into a cough. “There is no solution.“
	“Trust me. Tomorrow is going to be one of my unusually persuasive days.”
	“As I see it, it’s cost us only a few pieces of gold to discover how unfashionable we are. Most social failures incur far greater expense, I should think.“
	“Somewhere out there,” said Jean, “must be an illness that makes its sufferers meek, mild, and agreeable. I’ll find it some day, and see that you get the worst possible case.”
	“I’m sure I was born immune. Speaking of agreeable, will that wine be arriving in my hands any time this year?“
	Locke had seemed alert enough, but his voice was slightly slurred, and weaker than it had been even the day before. Jean approached the bed uneasily, wine glasses half out before him like a peace offering to some unfamiliar and potentially dangerous creature.
	Locke had been in this condition before, too thin and too pale, with weeks of stubble on his cheeks. Only this time there was no obvious wound to tend, no cuts to close. Just Maxilan Stragos‘ insidious substance doing its silent work. Locke’s sheets were spotted with blood and with the dark stains of sweat from the fevers that came and went several times a day now. Locke’s eyes gleamed at the back of bruised sockets like lights at the distant ends of underground passages. 

	Jean pored over a pile of medical texts each night, and still he didn’t have adequate words for what was happening to Locke. He was being unknit from the inside out; his veins and sinews were coming apart. Blood seeped out of him as though by some demonic whim. One hour he might cough it up, the next it would come from his eyes or nose. 
	“Gods damn it,“ Jean whispered as Locke reached for the wine glass. Locke’s left hand was red with blood— it looked as though each of his fingers had been dipped in it. “What’s happened?“
	“That? Oh, hell.“ Locke chuckled. “Nothing unusual. It just started up while you were gone. . . from under my nails. Here, I can hold the glass with my other one—“
	“What, were you trying to hide it from me? Who else changes your gods-damned sheets?“
	Jean set the wine glasses down and moved to the small table beneath the window. The table was covered in stacks of linen towels Jean had laid in for use as bandages, beside a water jug and a washing bowl. The bowl’s water was brown with old blood. 
	“It doesn’t hurt, Jean,“ muttered Locke. 
	Ignoring him, Jean picked up the bowl. The window overlooked the villa’s interior courtyard, which was fortunately deserted. Jean heaved the old bloody water out the window, refilled the bowl from the jug, and dipped a linen cloth into it.

	“Hold your hand up,“ said Jean. Locke sulkily complied, and Jean molded the wet cloth around his fingers. It rapidly turned pink. “Keep that hand elevated for a while.“
	“I know it looks bad, but it’s really not that much blood.“
	“Blood is blood. You’ve not that much to lose.“
	“I’m also in want of wine.“
	Jean fetched their glasses again and carefully placed one in Locke’s right hand. Locke’s shakes didn’t seem too bad for the moment, which was pleasing. He’d had difficulty holding things lately. 
	“A toast,“ said Locke, nudging his glass clumsily toward Jean’s. “To alchemists. May they all be stricken with pox of the prick.“ He took a sip of his wine. “Or consumed by fire. Whatever’s most convenient. I’m not picky.“
	At his next sip, he coughed, and a ruby-colored droplet spiralled down into his wine, leaving a purplish tail as it dissolved.
	“Gods,“ said Jean. He downed the rest of his own wine in a gulp and all but tossed the glass aside. “I’m going out to fetch Malcor.“
	“Jean, I don’t need another damn dog-leech at the moment. He’s been here six or seven times already, why—“
	“Something might have changed. Something might be different.“ Jean grabbed his coat. “Maybe he can help the bleeding. Maybe he’ll finally find some clue—“
	“There is no clue, Jean. There is no change, and there’s no damned antidote that’s going to spring from Malcor or Kepira or Zodesti or any boil-lancing fraud in this whole miserable—“
	“I’ll be back soon.“
	“Dammit, Jean, save the money!“ Locke coughed again, and nearly dropped his wine. “It's only common sense, you brick-skulled tub of obstinate-"
	“I’ll be back soon.“
	". . . obstinate, uh, something. . . something. . . biting and witty and thoroughly convincing! Hey, if you leave now, you'll miss me being thoroughly convincing, damn it!"
	Whatever Locke might have said next, Jean closed the door on it. The sky outside was now banded in twilight colors, orange at the horizons giving way to silver and then purple in the deep bowl of the heavens. Purple like the color of blood dissolving in blue wine.      
	A low gray wall sliding in to the north, from out of the Amathel, seemed to promise an oncoming storm. That suited Jean just fine.

4

	Six weeks had passed since they’d left the little port of Vel Virazzo in a forty-foot yacht, fresh from a series of more or less total disasters that had left them with about a twentieth of the vast sum they’d hoped to reap for two years invested in a complex scheme.   

	As he walked out into the cobbled streets of Lashain, Jean ran his fingers over a lock of curly dark hair, tightly bound with leather cords. This he kept in a coat pocket or tucked into his belt at all times. Of all the things he’d lost recently, the money was actually the least of his concerns. 
	Locke and Jean had discussed sailing east, back toward Tamalek and Espara. . . back toward Camorr. But most of the world they’d known there was swept away, and most of their old friends were dead. Neither of them had any desire as yet to go within a thousand miles of the old places. So they'd gone north and west.
	Following the coast, straining their lubberly skills to the utmost, they had skirted Tal Verrar, swept past the blackened remains of once-luxurious Salon Corbeau, and discussed making far north for Balinel, in the Kingdom of the Seven Marrows. Both of them spoke Vadran well enough to do just about anything while they looked for some new criminal opportunity to reveal itself. 
	They left the sea and headed inland, up the wide River Cavendria, which had been tamed (first by Eldren, then by humans) for the safe passage of oceangoing vessels. The Cavendria flowed west from the Amathel, the Lake of Jewels, the inland sea that separated the ancient sister cities of Karthain and Lashain. Locke and Jean had once hoped to buy their way into the ranks of Lashain’s nobility; their revised plan had merely been to put in and weigh their little boat down with stores for the voyage up to Balinel. 

	Locke’s symptoms revealed themselves the day they entered the Cavendria estuary.
	At first it had been nothing more than bouts of dizziness and blurred vision, but as the days passed and they slowly tacked against the current, he began bleeding from his nose and the corners of his mouth. By the time they reached Lashain, he could no longer joke away the trickles of blood, or hide his increasing weakness. Instead of taking on stores, they’d rented rooms, and against Locke’s protests Jean began to spend nearly every coin they had on alchemists, physikers, herbalists, and assorted cures and comforts.
	From Lashain’s underworld, which was tolerably colorful if not nearly as vast as Camorr’s, he’d consulted every poisoner and black alchemist he could bribe or coerce. All of them had shaken their heads and expressed professional admiration for what had been done to Locke; the substance in question was beyond their power to counteract. Locke had been made to drink a hundred different purgatives, teas, and elixirs, each seemingly more vile and expensive than the last, until Jean began to fear that one of them would kill him before the poison finished its work. 
	After that, Jean had dressed well and begun to call upon the accredited physikers of the city. Locke was explained away as a “confidential servant“ of someone wealthy and important, which could have meant anything from secret lover to private assassin. The physikers too had expressed regret and fascination in equal measure. Most of them had refused to attempt cures, instead offering palliatives to ease Locke’s pain. Jean fully grasped the meaning of this, but paid no heed to their pessimism. He simply showed each to the door, paid their exorbitant fees, and went out after the next physiker on his list. 
	The money hadn’t lasted. After a few days, Jean had sold their boat (along with the resident cat, essential for good luck at sea), and he was happy to get half of what they’d paid for it just a few weeks before. 
	Now even those funds were running thin, and Erkemar Zodesti was just about the only physiker in all of Lashain who had yet to tell Jean that Locke’s condition was hopeless. 

5

	“No new symptoms,“ said Malcor, a round old man with a gray beard that curled out from his chin like an oncoming thunderhead. Malcor was a dog-leech, a street physiker with no formal training or license, but of all his kind available in the northern districts of Lashain he was the most frequently sober. “Merely a new expression of familiar symptoms. Take heart.“
	“Not likely,“ said Locke. “But thanks for the hand job.“
	Malcor had poulticed the tips of Locke’s fingers with a mixture of corn meal and honey, and then tied dry linen bandages around the fingers, turning Locke’s left hand into a padded lump of uselessness. 
	“Heh. Well, the gods love a man who laughs at hardship.“
	“Hardship is boring as all hell. Gotta find laughs if you can’t stay drunk,“ said Locke. 
	“So the bleeding is nothing new? Nothing worse than before?“ asked Jean.
	“A new inconvenience, yes.“ Malcor hesitated, then shrugged. “Ah, as for the total loss to his body’s warm and wet humours. . . nothing worse than the bleeding from his nose or mouth. A close examination of his water could, perhaps—“
	“You want a bowl full of piss,“ said Locke, “you can uncork your private reserve. I’ve given quite enough since I came here.“
	“Well then.“ Malcor patted him on the shoulder and stood up. His knees creaked like rusty hinges. “If I won’t scry your piss, I won’t scry your piss. I can, however, leave you with a pill that should bring you excellent relief for twelve to twenty-four hours, and perhaps encourage your depleted humours to rekindle—“
	“Splendid,“ said Locke. “Will it be the one composed primarily of chalk, this time? Or the one made of sugar? I’d prefer the sugar.“
	“Look. . . I say, look here!“ Malcor’s seamy old face grew red. “I might not have Collegium robes, but when I go to the gods they’ll know that I gave an honest damn about lending ease to my patients!“
	“Peace, old man.“ Locke coughed and rubbed his eyes very carefully with his unbandaged hand. “I know you mean the best. But spare me your placebo.“
	“Have your friend remove your bandages in a few hours,“ said Malcor testily, shrugging back into a worn frock coat that was spattered with many old dark stains. “If you drink, drink sparingly. Water your wine and try to make it last.“
	“Rest assured I have trouble fetching and pouring for myself at the moment. My friend here waters my wine like a virgin princess’ nervous chaperone.“
	“I’m sorry,“ said Jean, when he had closed the door to the inner apartment behind them and was showing Malcor outside. “He’s. . . difficult when he’s ill.“
	“I give him two or three days,“ said the old man.
	“You can’t be—“
	“Yes, I can. The bleeding is worse. His enervation is more pronounced. His humours are terminally imbalanced and I’m certain an examination of his water would show blood. I tried to hearten him but your friend is obviously undeceived.”
	“But—“
	“As should you be.”
	“There must be someone who can do something!”
	“The gods.”
	“If I could convince Zodesti—“
	“Zodesti?” Malcor laughed. “What a waste of a gift in that one. Zodesti treats only two ailments, wealth and prominence. He’ll never condescend to do so much as take your friend’s pulse.”
	“So you’ve no other clues? No other suggestions?”
	“Summon priests. While he can still hear and speak.” Jean scowled, and the aged dog-leech reached out to take him gently by the shoulders. “I can't name the poison that’s killing your friend. But the one that’s killing you is called hope.” 
	“Thank you for your time,” growled Jean. He shook several silver coins out of a small purse. “If I should have further need of these marvelous insights—“
	“A single duvesta will be quite adequate,” said Malcor. “And despite your mood now, know that I’ll come whenever you require. Your friend’s discomfort is more like to wax than wane before the end.”
	The sun was gone, and the roofs and towers of the city were coming alive with specks of fire against the deepening night. As he watched Malcor vanish down the street, Jean wanted more than anything to have someone to hit. 

6

	“A fair day to you,” said Jean, approaching the garden gate once again. It was the second hour of the afternoon, the very next day, and the sky overhead was a boiling mess of gray. The rain had yet to fall, but it was coming, certain and soon. “I'm here to petition Scholar Zodesti for a consultation.”
	“How completely unexpected,” said the old man behind the iron bars.
	“Is it a convenient time?” From inside the garden, Jean could hear laughter once again, along with a series of repeated echoing smacks, as though something were being thrown against a stone wall. “Or is the scholar consumed—“
	“By work. Stranger, has the conversation we had yesterday fled your memory already?”
	“I beg you, sir, I beg you.” Jean put as much passionate sincerity as he could into his voice. “A good man lies dying, in desperate need of aid. Did your master not take oath as a physiker of the Collegium?”
	“His oaths are no business of yours. And many good men lay dying, in desperate want of aid, in Lashain and Karthain and every other place in the world. Do you see the scholar saddling his horse to seek them out?”
	“Please.” Jean held up a large envelope and a small one, giving the small one a shake to allow the coins within it to jingle. “Carry the message. At least carry the message, for the love of all the gods.”
	Wearing half a scowl and half a smirk, the servant reached out through the bars to take the envelopes. Jean tossed them aside. His left hand shot out, seized the old man by the collar, and slammed him hard against the gate. An instant later his right hand came up so the servant could see the knife Jean was holding.
	It was a push-dagger, the sort wielded with a thrusting fist rather than a fencer’s grip. The blade that sat hard against Jean’s knuckles was about half a foot long, broad and sturdy, and curved like an upside-down animal’s claw. 
	“There’s only one use for a knife like this,” whispered Jean. “You see it? You try to call out or pull away, and you’ll be wearing your belly-fat for an apron. Open the gate.”
	“You’ll die for this, stranger,” hissed the servant. “They’ll skin you and boil you in salt water.”
	“And what a consolation that will be for you, eh?” Jean poked him in the stomach with the tip of his knife. “Open the gate or I’ll take the keys from your corpse and do it myself.”
	With a shaking hand, the old man opened the gate. Jean threw it aside, grabbed the servant again, and turned him around. The knife was now at the small of the man’s back.
	“Take me to your master. Stay composed. Tell him that a desperate and important case has come up and that he will want to hear my offer.”
	“The scholar is in the garden. But you’re mad. . . he has friends in the highest places. . . urk!”
	Jean poked him again with the knife, urging him forward.
	“Of course he does,” said Jean. “But do you have any friends closer than my knife?"
	At the heart of the garden, a short, solid man of about thirty-five was sharing a hearty laugh with a woman who had yet to see twenty. Both of them wore light breeches, silk shirts, and padded leather gloves. That explained the rhythmic smacking noise from before. They’d been playing pursava, the partner chase, an aristocratic cousin of handball where two people rebounded a cork ball off a hard surface, in this case a section of the rear stone wall where the hedges had been trimmed away. 
	“Sir, madam, a thousand pardons,” said the old servant at another poke from Jean’s blade. Jean stood half a pace behind the man, where neither Zodesti nor his guest could see the true means of his entry into the garden. “A very. . . a very urgent matter, sir.”
	“Urgent?” Zodesti had a decadent mop of black curls, now slick with sweat, and the remains of an upper-class Verrari accent. “Who does this fellow come to speak for?”
	“An eminent friend,” said Jean. “In the usual fashion. It would not be appropriate to discuss these matters in front of your young—“
	“By the gods, I’ll say what’s appropriate or not in my own garden! This fellow has some cheek, Loran. You know my preferences. This had better be in earnest."
	“I'd say dire earnest, sir.”
	“Let him leave his particulars, then. If I find them suitable he may call again after dinner.”
	“Now would be better,” said Jean, “for everyone.” 
	“Who in all the hells do you think you are? Shit on your dire earnest! Loran, throw this—“
	“Refusal noted and cordially declined.” Jean hooked his right foot around Loran’s legs and gave the old man a hard shove, sending him to the turf. Half a second later he was upon Zodesti, with a meaty forearm wrapped around the physiker’s throat and his blade held up so the young woman could see it. “Cry out for help and I will use this, madam. I would hate to have an injury to the scholar resting upon your conscience.”
	“I. . . I. . .” she said.
	“Babble all you like, so long as you don’t scream. As for you--” Jean pressed the man’s windpipe hard to demonstrate his strength, and the physiker gasped. “I’ve tried to be civil. I would have paid well. But now I’ll teach you a new way of doing business. Do you have a kit you would bring to a case of poisoning? Materials you'd need for a consultation?”
	“Yes,” choked Zodesti. “In my study.”
	“Then we’re going to calmly walk into your house, all of us. Get on your feet, Loran. You have a carriage and driver on the grounds, scholar?”
	“Yes, yes,” said Zodesti.
	“Then we're all going inside as though nothing is amiss. And if any of you give me any trouble, by the gods, I’ll start practicing throat surgery."

*****