Steven Brust - Hawk

“Want to go inside?” he asked

I shook my head. “I’m more comfortable in the open.”

“All right.”

He glanced at his bodyguards, and nodded a little, and they all moved out of earshot, though not without significant looks at the weapon I was holding. The Demon glanced down at the body, looked at me, and gave me a little smile.

“Isn’t it nice that our interests line up again,” he said.

“If they do.”

I still wouldn’t re-sheathe Lady Teldra. He pretended not to notice. “How could they not?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I missed something. Maybe you just killed one of your own people to make it look good.”

“You think I’d do that?”

“No. I don’t think you would. But I don’t know for sure.”

“Nah,” he said. “You didn’t miss anything. You’ve set it up so it’s in my-our-interest to keep you alive. Poletra hates it, but he isn’t as stupid as he seems. He’ll face facts.”

“And the others? In particular, that Diyann guy?”

The Demon nodded. “You’ll be all right, but don’t make any mistakes. And don’t think you can now push this as far as you want. I know Diyann. If you go too far, he’ll get to the point where he’ll cut his own throat just to cut yours.”

“Yeah, that’s how I read him. As long as he isn’t there now.”

“He isn’t.”

“Good. And the Jhereg has nothing to worry about from me. My plans are full of having nothing to do with the Organization again, ever.”

“Good plan. We feel the same way about you.”

“Evidently not,” I said, and studied the dead guy.

He shook his head. “No,” he said.

“You’re sure it wasn’t Poletra? So mad or scared he just barked out the order without thinking it through?”

“I’m sure,” he said. “Trust me.”

You gotta love a guy with a sense of humor. I said, “How can you be so sure? You say it wasn’t you, but how can you know it wasn’t someone else?”

“In the first place, because no one would be that suicidal, after the Council gave the order. And in the second place, because I know who it was.”

“Oh? You going to tell me? Or is this information you plan to trade for something?”

He shrugged. “You’d get there anyway, sooner or later. It was the sorceresses.”

“The Left Hand? What did I do to them?”

“Worst thing you could have done: you gave them an opportunity.”

“I don’t-”

“Radfall.”

I shrugged. “So, she’s Left Hand. I know. But she was hired by one-”

“No, that isn’t it. She has, it seems, both an ear and a brain. She must have reported back fast.” He chuckled. “Too bad we weren’t using your new technique to listen in; would have saved some trouble.”

I shook my head. “I don’t get it. Reported what?”

“For a smart guy, Vlad, you’re pretty stupid sometimes.”

“If I’m stupid, how-”

“Don’t go there.”

“All right, then explain.”

“This process. It’s just their kind of thing, isn’t it.”

“I suppose.”

“And it’s huge. That’s why we got greedy with it, and tried to get both it and you.”

“Which I was counting on.”

“Yeah, which you were counting on. Aren’t you smart. And Terion was just killed, which sort of threw us off. Someone more suspicious than me might wonder if you had anything to do with that.”

“Of course I didn’t.”

“Of course you didn’t.”

I said, “So that all worked. But, you were saying, the Left Hand?”

He nodded. “But the only thing better for them than having that process, is having that process without competition.”

“Who-? Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“Let’s see if I have this right. They kill me, the Empire strips half the Council of everything. The Jhereg-the Right Hand-is crippled, and the Left Hand gets the technique and to keep all the profits.”

“Yep.”

“I should have seen that coming.”

“Yep.”

“For a smart guy, I can be pretty stupid.”

“Yeah,” he said.

I said, “But, won’t the Organization come down on them like, I don’t know, like something that comes down on things?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. If it’s clear they have all the power, then no. If it looks like we might able to make them pay, then yes.”

“And so the ugliness continues.”

“Yeah.”

“And I’m just as deep in the middle of it as I ever was.”

“Yeah.”

“Think I can make a deal with them?”

“Is it true that you killed Crithnak’s sister?”

“You know it’s true.”

“Morganti?”

“That part was sort of an accident.”

“I don’t think you can make a deal with them.”

“All right.”

I considered whether I should kill the Demon anyway, just on general principles. With me holding Lady Teldra, there was a pretty good chance his bodyguards couldn’t protect him. But then I’d have the Jhereg after me again, because you don’t put a shine on a Council member without permission from the rest of the Council, and far be it from me to break one of the unwritten Jhereg laws.

Again.

I finally sheathed Lady Teldra. To his credit, the Demon didn’t show any special reaction. He said, “I have to say, even so, you came up with a good plan, and you made it work.”

“Actually,” I said, “there’s one part of my plan that isn’t complete yet.”

“Oh?”

I dug into my pouch and pulled out a flask. I pulled the orange out, and the knife with the hollow blade. I punctured the orange, and, calling on all of my skill and finesse, dribbled some of the liqueur into the orange.

The Demon watched with a sort of mild, detached interest.

I put the knife away and held the orange for about ten seconds, then sucked some of the liqueur back out through the hole I’d just cut.

Gods of the Paths, it was good!

I offered the orange to the Demon. He raised his eyebrows, shrugged, took it, drank.

“That’s quite good,” he said.

I nodded. “It’s an old traditional drink from the East. Usually reserved for celebrating a triumph.”

He handed the orange back. I had some more. “I’m not sure how much you have to celebrate,” he said. “What with one thing and another.”

I shrugged and had another sip.

“I guess we’ll see,” I said.

“That we will. Thanks for the drink.”

“Thanks for the rescue.”

“Take care, Taltos. We’ll probably meet again.”

“Maybe,” I said.

He turned and walked away. I stood watching him until he and his bodyguards were well out of sight. Then I walked back to the edge of the cliff and stared out some more.

I had another drink. It was supposed to be a celebration of the end of a job, of my new freedom. Well, I guess it was a freedom of a different kind.

And, instead of the end of a job, it was the beginning of another.

I finished the orange and threw it over the cliff, onto Kieron’s Rocks, where some bird would no doubt enjoy what was left of it. Darkness was falling; the wind shifted.

I stood on the cliff staring out over the ocean-sea. Below me were Kieron’s Rocks. If I were into sacrificing everything for melodramatic gestures, I’d leap off the cliff. I’m perfectly willing to make a melodramatic gesture when it’s called for, but I won’t sacrifice everything for it.

“Boss?”

“Yeah.”

“So, it isn’t over. It’s just that now it’s the Left Hand instead?”

“Yeah.”

“So this is just going to go on and on?”

“No.”

“No?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m tired of it.”