Intrigues (26 page)

Zirdon's racing mind came to an idea, and he seized it immediately. It would regain his control of the meeting even if it
did
show the strength of his position prematurely. He'd meant to show that strength in a different way, but there was no sense in having power if you didn't use it when you needed it.

"People, please!" Zirdon called out after standing and taking a step forward. "Give me your attention for a moment." The frenzied babble died down most of the way, and Zirdon smiled his most charming smile. "These issues that were just raised are much too important to consider without serious prior discussion, which they haven't had. I propose that we adjourn this meeting for a short time to hold that discussion, and reconvene in two hours. A show of hands in agreement with my proposal should suffice in place of a formal vote."

Zirdon smiled pleasantly at Antrie Lorimon, wanting to see her expression when three of the members of her coalition abandoned her. Those three members would give him the ten votes he needed to have the final say over
anything
the assembly considered, making him the most powerful man in the empire. The Lorimon chit gazed back at him with her own faint smile, not yet aware of how thoroughly she'd been bested, so Zirdon turned his gaze to a count of the votes.
That
would show her…

The smile died on Zirdon's face as he saw something he didn't believe, and frantically he looked around again. There were only two hands raised around the circle of assembly seats, and one of them, belonging to the man Ebro something or other, seemed more tentative than certain. Not only didn't Zirdon have the support of three of Lorimon's people, four members of his own coalition had abandoned him! How was that possible?

The flat-eyed stare coming from Olskin Dinno told Zirdon part of the story. Dinno had apparently increased the number of his minor coalition to four, and now he'd taken all of them out of Zirdon's camp. But what about the others, the three supporters of Lorimon who were supposed to support
him
instead?

Glancing from one to the other of the three men brought Zirdon to instant fury. The three were staring at him with dark vindictiveness, and there could only be one reason for the attitude. Zirdon had promised them Sheedra Kam's use in return for their support, and somehow they already knew he was no longer able to make good on the promise. It was the same hold he'd had on the members of Dinno's minor coalition, and they
all
knew…

Antrie Lorimon's smile hadn't widened even by so much as a breath, but Zirdon knew without a doubt that she stood there laughing at him.
She
had to be responsible for this disaster, for stealing from him the position that should have been his and relegating him to the place of a very minor coalition leader. Only three votes! What was he supposed to do with only three votes?

There was
nothing
he could do with only three votes, but that would change. As Zirdon quietly sat down again he vowed to himself that the situation would change back again even if he had to burn Antrie Lorimon to cinders…!

* * *

Cleemor Gardan kept his expression neutral, but on the inside he laughed gleefully. Zirdon Tal had been completely humiliated, and it would be quite a while before he regained any of his power. The man now sat in his seat and glowered around, having no idea that he was too stupid to use power properly. If he'd gained control of the assembly their empire would probably have been doomed, but Cleemor had made sure that
that
became impossible. Telling everyone of Tal's loss of Sheedra Kam had more than done the job. If Tal hadn't been an incompetent fool, he would have found a stronger tie than the use of a pretty girl to bind his people to him.

"Please, my friends, let's discuss this problem in a way we can all follow," Antrie said, raising her sweet voice only a small bit. "I'll start us off by saying that we can't expect to
fight
the Gandistrans, and not just because the idea of open fighting is distasteful to most of us. Our empire has fifteen Blendings represented by this assembly, but the fact that our Blendings outnumber theirs doesn't matter. They have far too many High talents acting together, and a miscalculation through overconfidence on our part could mean disaster."

"Then what do you propose we do?" Olskin Dinno, formerly a fairly staunch supporter of the fool Zirdon, asked in a more than reasonable way. "Do we send a contingent of our own Highs to refuse them entry to Liandia? If they're more interested in peace than war with their neighbors, they just might not press the point."

"Yes, you're right," Antrie granted him in that cool and gracious way of hers. "There's every chance they would
not
enter the city if we forbade it, but I'm afraid that that would scarcely solve our problem. Our refusal would let them know that we have something to hide, and if they had any intelligence at all they would then quietly send in people to find out what that something was.
You
tell
me
, Olskin. Would they have much trouble discovering what our intentions toward them were?"

"Unfortunately not," Dinno agreed with a sigh. "By making sure that our intentions had the approval of everyone in the city, we
told
everyone in the city what we meant to do. At the time I wasn't certain that that was the wisest course of action, but I never expected to learn we were wrong in
this
particular way."

Dinno only glanced in Zirdon Tal's direction, but other members of the assembly glared at the Fire magic user. Tal had been the one to talk everyone into "sharing" their plans to invade and conquer Gandistra with the populace, supposedly to gain their understanding agreement. Cleemor privately believed that the gesture had been a ploy on Tal's part to let the man reap all the credit when their plans worked, but now the effort had backfired on him. The mistake was typical of the fool's lack of imagination…

"Well, it's too late to take back the information, and it's certainly too late to reconsider," Antrie said, her tone now soothing and sympathetic. And, of course, she made no mention of the fact that she had been against letting everyone know what they meant to do. "So we can't insist that the Gandistrans stay out of our city and we can't give them free access to it, but there's one thing we
can
do. If we invite them in and treat them as
very
important people, we ought to be able to keep them from coming in close contact with the populace."

"And in the meantime we spread the word," Cleemor added into the low and thoughtful buzz of comments, speaking the suggestion that really was his. "This time we
do
have to tell everyone about what's going on, and make sure that the people understand what's at stake here. If
we
go down because someone speaks out of turn, there's a very good chance that everyone in the city will go with us. We can't be everywhere to make sure that people keep their mouths closed, but our citizenry
is
everywhere. It will be everyone's job to watch his or her neighbor."

"I hate the need to make everyone watch everyone else, but I honestly see no other way to handle the matter." Antrie spoke quietly, responding to the frowns clear on a number of faces. "And it shouldn't be for very long anyway. Once we've been able to sound out this new Seated Blending, we can make up some story about how a previous faction in the assembly tried to force our empire into war. We, of course, wanted nothing to do with something like that, and we struggled hard to displace that terrible faction. Now that we've accomplished our aim, we'll be able to offer peace and friendship instead."

Some members of the assembly chuckled a bit at that, and others lost much of their expressions of distaste. If Tal's smooth charm had swayed people to support his point of view, Antrie was at least as adept at doing the same – but with more imagination. People began to relax all over the room, and a smattering of applause came from the ordinary people watching the proceedings.

"Does anyone have any other suggestions about what we might do?" Antrie put after a moment or two as she looked around. "Our planning is by no means finalized, so any and all suggestions will be welcome. If you can't think of anything at the moment, don't hesitate to get in touch with us when you do get an idea. We certainly want to hear from you, and we won't do anything at all without the full knowledge and consent of this assembly. Let's think about it for a day or two, and then we'll meet again."

The immediate murmur of agreement came through clearly, and Cleemor chuckled to himself as he stood and stretched. Antrie had kept saying "we" to sooth the indignation of some of their more stiff-necked male colleagues. If she'd even hinted that she was in charge of their coalition the fools would have balked, immediately refusing to ally themselves with people led by a woman. By using the word "we" Antrie had suggested that there were really men in charge, and she simply spoke for them. As well as the woman knew and handled people, she should have been a Spirit magic user rather than Air magic…

"So how do you think it went?" Antrie murmured very low once she had walked over to him. "We have most of them following our lead now, but will we keep them long enough to save ourselves?"

"We should, if we don't run into something unexpected," Cleemor murmured in return as he glanced around. "Zirdon looks positively murderous, but I'm willing to bet that he has no clear plan to dig himself out of the pit we've thrown him into. If he can't think of anything to help himself, and he probably won't, I would not put it past him to attack you physically in some sneaking, behind-the-back way."

"I've already considered that," Antrie said with a smile, then gestured with one graceful hand. "Let's walk out to the carriages before we continue this conversation."

Considering the fact that people seemed to be moving around in all directions, Cleemor agreed at once. Keeping their voices down would hardly make their conversation private if others happened to be standing near enough to catch a few words. Cleemor offered his arm, and Antrie took it with another smile. Once they were outside and strolling along one of the walks that broke up the expanse of lawn in front of the assembly building, however, Antrie's smile faded to nothing.

"I decided it might be best if I worked with the other members of my Blending on personal protection," Antrie said with a sigh when it was clear that no one else walked near them. "There is now a … thin layer of hardened air all around me, and nothing but fresh air should be able to get through it. We molded it tightly to my entire body and head, so it shouldn't be noticeable. Are
you
able to discern it?"

Cleemor reached for the power with a frown, and once he'd opened to it and used his ability he was able to see just the hint of what she'd done.

"If you hadn't told me the layer was there, I would have dismissed the very faint indications of displacement," Cleemor admitted after a moment. "I'm pleased that you're finally doing something positive to protect yourself, rather than relying on being ignored."

"After this morning, I'm not likely to be ignored as much as I would like," Antrie told him ruefully with a sigh as they continued to stroll. "Zirdon certainly knows who ruined his plans to make himself supreme leader of the assembly, and he's really nothing but a large, overindulged child. He'll sulk for a little while, and then he might well decide to 'get even.' That's why I'd like to ask
you
to protect yourself in the same way I have."

"Me?" Cleemor said in surprise, about to protest the need, but then he thought better of the reaction. "All right, yes, you're probably right. Zirdon knows how close we are, just as everyone in the assembly does. If something happens to me you'll be left as 'nothing but a woman,' and Zirdon might then be able to take back control."

"At the very least he'd try, so I do appreciate your agreement," Antrie told him with the sparkle of mischief in her beautiful eyes. "If you'd refused to protect yourself and then had died, I would have been very vexed with you."

"Not as vexed as Tenia would have been," Cleemor countered with a chuckle. "My lovely wife is very firm about how well I'm to take care of myself, and even dead I would
not
want to have the two of you angry with me. I have the definite feeling I'd know all about that anger, and be made to regret it."

"That's very wise of you, my dear," Antrie said, but then the amusement disappeared from her again. "Have your people had any luck with identifying our hidden enemy? It's no longer likely that Zirdon will be his or her first target, and that's another reason for us to protect ourselves. If we let ourselves become flushed with victory, we could well be handing over the game."

"And that's something we really don't want to do," Cleemor agreed, heaving his own sigh. "No, my people haven't had any luck yet. How about yours?"

"My ladies have found the same nothing," Antrie said, frustration now peeking out of her eyes. "But I've given them a suggestion you might want to pass on to your own people. Instead of trying to find out who the enemy
is
, it might be easier in this instance to eliminate those it
can't
be. At worst we'll be left with only two or three suspects, and at best we could conceivably be left with only one."

"That's a good idea, but I have one suggestion," Cleemor said with sudden enthusiasm. "It would be a waste of time and effort for our people to investigate the same suspects, so let's divide the list. With you, me, and Zirdon already eliminated there are twelve assembly members left, meaning six for each group."

"Yes, we could do that, but you must caution your people just as I have," Antrie said with a slow, thoughtful nod. "No one can be eliminated without a concrete reason to back up the elimination, no matter what those doing the investigating
believe
. I'd rather have multiple suspects than pass by the guilty party because he or she doesn't
look
guilty."