Her brows came together and she looked genuinely puzzled. “Vlad, there isn’t any secret about that. We’ve been agitating about it since it happened, and—”
“Publicly?”
“Of course.”
“What about privately?”
“I’m not sure what you mean.” She said it as if she really wasn’t. I hesitated, and she said, “Maybe you could give me an idea of why you need to know.”
“Um,” I said. “Some of this I can’t tell you.”
Her eyes sparkled for a moment, just like they used to. “Explain to me again what you were saying about needing to know things and no one being willing to tell you anything.”
I felt myself smiling. “Yeah.”
Vlad Norathar remained in his chair, his eyes moving from one of us to the other as we spoke. He had some of his wine, holding the mug in both hands, his eyes watching me over the rim. I’ve been stared at by a lot scarier guys who made me a lot less nervous. I cleared my throat.
“Everything ties into everything else,” I said.
She nodded. “Yes, we’ll start with the big generalizations. Okay, go on.”
I suppressed a growl. “The Jhereg is up to something big and nasty,” I said. “They’re working with the Orca. I don’t know how unrest among Teckla and Easterners will play into it. It might work against what they’re doing, in which case your group will be a target. Or it might work for it, in which case you’ll be helping them.”
“Vlad, I don’t know where you get the idea that we can control popular unrest. We can’t. On the day we can, we’ll be living in a different world.”
“Um. All right, suppose I accept that. I don’t think the Jhereg will.”
She nodded. “I appreciate the warning; I’ll pass it on.”
“Good,” I said. “But that wasn’t actually what I was after.”
“All right. What are you after?”
“Trying to figure out what will happen, how the Jhereg will respond, how the Empire will respond to that, and how I have to respond to the Empire.”
She nodded. “Good luck with that.”
“I drown in the depths of your sympathy.”
“Vlad—”
I sighed. “Okay.”
“I just don’t know what I can tell you that would do you any good.”
“Do you expect riots?”
“I wish I knew. People are angry enough. We’re doing all we can to stop them, but—”
“Stop them?”
She blinked. “Of course, Vlad. A riot isn’t going to do anything except get some heads broken.”
“Um. Okay, looks like I need to re-evaluate.”
“Does this throw off your plan?”
“No, not that bad. I hadn’t gotten as far as having a plan.”
She nodded; she knew my way of working as well as anyone. Better than anyone. “We’re not the only group working in South Adrilankha and among the Teckla, you know.”
“Um. Actually, I didn’t know that.”
“There are at least six independent organizations.”
“Really. Well. What would happen if you all got together?”
“To do what?”
“Eh, I don’t know.”
“If we all got together, neither would we. Since we have opposite ideas on what to do, ‘getting together’ doesn’t seem like it would accomplish a great deal, does it?”
“Okay, okay. I hadn’t meant to start something. What are these other groups up to?”
She rolled her eyes. “Various things. Some of them are getting up petitions to the Empire. Some are organizing food and money to be sent to the survivors in Tirma. Some are organizing marches demanding the Empire investigate. Some are encouraging people to individual acts of violence against Imperial representatives. Some—”
“Wait a minute. Acts of violence?”
Her lips pressed together and she nodded. “Politically naive is the kindest thing you can say about it; suicidal is more accurate.”
“Can you tell me what they’re planning?”
She gave me a hard look. “From what I know of them, they aren’t planning anything, they’re just encouraging people to attack Imperial Representatives. And if they were planning something, I wouldn’t be in a position to know what it is. And if I were in such a position, I certainly wouldn’t tell you about it.”
She’s very good with hard looks. I hadn’t noticed Vlad Norathar reacting to her voice, but he must have, because Cawti reached out and stroked his head.
“Understood,” I said. “I won’t press you on that.”
“And if you’re going to find them, you’ll do it without my—”
“I don’t plan to do that,” I said.
“All right.”
I didn’t, either. Whatever their chances were of killing someone, their chances of actually affecting things were nil. But something or someone else might. Maybe. I needed to think.
“You look like you need to think,” she said.
I nodded.
She was quiet. So was the boy, except that his eyes were very loud. I stood up and paced; he watched me. After a little bit, I said, “It isn’t the group that wants to kill Imperial Representatives that bothers me. It’s the group pressing for an investigation.”
“Actually,” said Cawti, “that’s something we’re pressing for, too. But we want an investigation by us, by the people; they want the Empire to investigate itself.”
I digested that. “Do you think you’ll get anywhere with your, ah, independent investigation?”
“I don’t think asking the Empire to investigate itself is going to get anything. Do you?”
“That,” I said, “is just what I’m trying to figure out.”
She snorted. “Even if they could convince—”
“They don’t have to. It’s already happening.”
She stopped. “Is it indeed?”
“So I’m told.”
“I hadn’t heard about it.”
“It’s pretty new. Also, probably, pretty secret.”
“A secret investigation,” she said. “Well, I think we can all have a lot of confidence in that.”
“I think the Empress wants to know what happened, and why.”
“I’d like to know myself,” said Cawti.
“But there are others who don’t.”
She arched an eyebrow.
“The Jhereg,” I said.
“The Jhereg? Why would they care?”
“It might interfere with the schemes they’re trying to hatch.”
“What exactly are these famous schemes?”
“That,” I said, “is exactly what I can’t talk about.”
She nodded.
“It’s better to talk about what’s bothering you,” said Vlad Norathar.
My first inclination was to argue with him, which is funny when you think about it. But I had the feeling Cawti wouldn’t have appreciated that, so I just said, “You’re right, but sometimes you have to not talk about things because you don’t want to get someone else in trouble.”
That seemed to make sense to him. He nodded.
“You have friends, you know,” said Cawti.
I nodded. “Hard to forget; it’s the only reason I’m still around to irritate the Jhereg. Have you heard anything from the Left Hand?”