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  Feriun hesitated very briefly before nodding his agreement and leaving, which made Sembrin smile to himself. Feriun already knew that some of his employer's gold was in the study, but the man didn't know just how much or exactly where it was. Feriun had probably been feeling the urge to do a bit of searching, but had wisely decided against throwing away his future for a few gold coins in his hand right now.

  Still, Sembrin thought as he went to the sideboard behind which the gold had been hidden, it might be a good idea to give Feriun a bonus as well. Gold will help him to remember who is in charge, and will also add enthusiasm to whatever he says to the men. Until the Throne is mine, I do still need the fool.

  And Feriun was a fool, something Sembrin knew without doubt. When brutality and death were all that people had to look forward to, they sometimes decided to make their death count by making a gesture. If that gesture resulted in harm to those who had taken charge of everyone's life, the purpose would be achieved. Sembrin had no desire to end up maimed or dead, so Jost Feriun would not be part of his new nobility once he was firmly seated on the Throne. There were other ways than brutality to have people in your complete control, and those were the ways that Sembrin would use.

  After counting out twenty pieces of gold, Sembrin returned the rest of the coins to their hiding place. It was a good thing that Bensia was no longer in a position to show her displeasure, otherwise Sembrin would have been given difficulty over handing out gold. This was their gold that he distributed so freely, but it did happen to be in a worthy cause. And in three days' time they would have more gold than even the old Bensia would have been able to spend…

  Sembrin gave Feriun the gold out in the hall rather than calling the man back into his study. Feriun was more pleased than he should have been to get two gold pieces when his men would get only one apiece, showing that the man was petty and greedy as well as a fool. Sembrin watched Feriun stride away, and once the man was gone Sembrin decided to find Bensia. There was cause to celebrate, and no reason not to celebrate in his very favorite way…

  Bensia Noll was annoyed. She'd seen the man Jost Feriun going into Sembrin's study, but by the time she'd found her son Travin the meeting was over.

  "So this time we'll just have to ask Father what he was told," Travin said with a shrug when Bensia pointed out the obvious. "If I could have overheard the conversation it would be unnecessary to bother, but we just didn't get here in time, Mother."

  "I don't like the idea of interrupting his daydreams, Travin," Bensia answered, her annoyance growing. "He'll stay under our control unless something shakes him out of it, so providing that something ourselves would be foolish."

  "Simply questioning him won't bring him out of it, Mother," Travin disagreed with entirely too much amusement. "His strength may be close to ours, but there are still more of us than there are of him."

  "That isn't the point, Travin," Bensia pointed out with forced patience. "If I hadn't noticed what he was doing just before we took him over, we might be the ones who were under control instead of him. We're too close to success right now to take any foolish chances, which is what turning your father loose at this time would be."

  "Very well, Mother, we'll do it your way," Travin agreed, but the put-upon tone in his voice accompanied by a sigh nearly made Bensia speak to him sharply. But this was also not the time for her to quarrel with her most loyal supporters, so Bensia forced herself to smile.

  "Thank you, Travin," Bensia said as she put a hand to her son's arm. "I know you take the idea of risks in stride, but I'm just a woman so I worry. You won't regret indulging my concerns."

  "Indulging you is always my pleasure, Mother," Travin responded with a smile of his own and a small bow. "Let's go and find out what Father was told."

  Bensia thanked him with a small nod, and then took his arm for the short walk to where her husband stood. As long as she remembered that Travin was a male first and her son second, there was no difficulty at all in controlling him even without the use of her talent.

  Bensia had, in a manner of speaking, frozen Sembrin in place. Her talent had made him lose himself in more than usual daydreams, and now he stood awaiting her and Travin's arrival. The man wasn't really aware of their presence, which was all to the good. Bensia nodded to Travin, to show that he was to do the questioning while she maintained her hold on Sembrin.

  "Commander Feriun was just here speaking to you, Father," Travin said softly as he also used his talent. "Tell me what the man had to say."

  "Today's attempts at swaying the peasants worked just the way they were supposed to," Sembrin answered, the words dreamy and distant. "They'll do the same thing tomorrow in another part of the city, and the day after that we'll have rabble-rousers forming mobs all over the city. When the mobs are fired up hot enough, we'll combine them and lead them in an attack on the palace. My men will be there to take over the palace once the mobs have gained them access, and they'll kill every member of the 'government' they can find. Then I'll go to the palace myself, and once the peasants are quieted I'll be Seated on the Throne."

  "That sounds lovely, Father, and it will come just in time," Travin murmured with a smile. "We're all beginning to feel very cramped in this tiny house. Did you give Commander Feriun any other orders?"

  "I told him to pay the men involved a bonus in gold," Sembrin answered, speaking with as little reluctance as he had earlier. "I also gave Feriun gold, to make sure he did pay over the bonus. He's to tell the men that there will be even more gold, and for all of them, once we're in the palace and in charge."

  Travin simply nodded when he heard that, but Bensia's reaction was quite a bit different. Simply giving away gold to commoners went against her nature, unless it happened to be someone else's gold. In this instance it had been her gold that was given away, and her anger rose high enough that she was drawn into thinking thoughts of revenge against this fool she happened to be married to. He'd known she'd never approve of his giving away her gold, and that was why he hadn't told her about it…

  "You can go back to what you were doing, Father," Travin said, the amusement in his voice drawing Bensia part way out of her anger. "And do keep up the good work."

  "Of course," Sembrin said, stirring back to life and motion. "Come along, Bensia."

  Bensia stood beside her son and watched her husband move off toward the stairs. The fool obviously intended to indulge his fantasies again, but this time Bensia found the intention offensive rather than amusing. She'd lost her hold on Sembrin a pair of moments earlier, but that didn't really matter. What mattered most was that the pretense was almost over. In three days it would be possible to let Sembrin know the truth, and then watch as he was chained at the foot of her throne. She and her children would be the ones who ruled the empire, her will controlling whatever was done.

  But before then she would have to have a serious talk with Travin. It had almost seemed that he'd stopped controlling his father simply because he thought that she was doing the controlling. Since anger had made her lose her hold on Sembrin, they could have had a serious problem if Travin really had released all control. But happily he hadn't - this time. Bensia led Travin away to find his brother and sisters, and then she would make sure that they never came this close to trouble again.

  Sembrin Noll felt oddly ill at ease as he led his wife into their apartment. He continued on into their bedchamber and held the door for Bensia, wondering what could possibly be wrong. When Bensia began to fade into nothingness and then disappeared entirely, Sembrin found himself badly shaken. But it wasn't simply Bensia's chilling disappearance that disturbed him. There was something more, something important…

  "By all the talents in the universe, none of this has been real!" Sembrin suddenly whispered to himself, the truth forcing itself from his lips. "I didn't give them Puredan, they put me under control!"

  Sembrin began to totter to a chair to collapse into it, but before he sat fury flared and raged all through him. The burning emotions kept
him on his feet, curled his hands into fists, and nearly had him scream at the top of his lungs. None of the pleasure he'd had was real, none of it, and his sense of personal safety had been just as much of an illusion.

  The need to scream grew greater, but some still-sane part of Sembrin forced him to deny the need. His loving family couldn't possibly know that he'd escaped their grip, otherwise they would have already reclaimed him. It would have been very satisfying to scream out his rage, but that would simply bring him to Bensia's attention. He had no idea how he'd managed to throw off the control, but it must have been his luck or their carelessness. If he depended on the same thing happening a second time…

  But he wasn't fool enough to depend on the same thing happening a second time. He had to take advantage of its happening this time, but as he ran his hands through his hair he couldn't think of a way to do it. But there had to be a way, otherwise he was as good as lost.

  Sembrin sat down in the chair he'd kept himself from collapsing in, leaned forward with his hands still in his hair, and began to think with all the energy of desperation behind the effort.

  Honrita Grohl glanced from one to the other of most of the members of her future Blending. She had these people well enough under her control that they could now meet in Ayl's shabby little hideaway and discuss their plans. The fools all thought that being part of the group was their own idea, and that was exactly the way Honrita wanted it. As long as they all continued to be under her control they could believe anything they cared to.

  "… and I stood outside the window of his house without anyone knowing I was there," Kadri Sumlow, their Earth magic user, was saying to everyone. Kadri was a heavy woman with dull, dark hair, but she always carried herself as though she were the queen of the universe and utterly beautiful. "The man is still sick, but he's making a slow but full recovery. Another few days and he'll be up and around."

  "It's about time," Stelk Faron, their Water magic user put in with his usual stiff disapproval. "We can't Blend until we have a Fire magic user, so this delay is wasting the time of all of us."

  Faron was a tall, thin man with narrow-faced features that seemed to be set in a perpetual frown. He was also the fussy kind of man that Honrita had trouble putting up with, but circumstances had forced her to make an exception. At least the man sat quietly when she wanted him to…

  "Dom Faron is perfectly right," Seeli Tandor said, showing her own frown of disapproval. The Air magic user was a tall, plain woman who didn't seem to have a personality of her own. Whenever she spoke it was as if she were borrowing the personality of one of those she sat among, most often the last person who had spoken. "We are all having our time wasted, which shouldn't be allowed to continue much longer. After all, we do have a rather special purpose that has brought us together."

  "And our purpose will be served, in the time it's destined to be served," Ayl said, showing them all his faint smile. "The last of your group will soon be with us, and then your Blending can be born."

  "What about our Sight magic user?" Sumlow put in, her regal expression showing a small bit of contempt for the obvious oversight. "Our Blending won't be complete without a Sight magic user."

  "That is a lie," Ayl said, his faint smile disappearing as his voice went cold and distant. "There is no such talent as Sight magic, else I would be able to detect it. The lie has been put out to fool the people into believing what isn't so, but the claim hasn't fooled me. We will never discuss this subject again."

  Honrita joined the others in exchanging glances without meaning to, so menacing had Ayl's tone been. The man found it impossible to admit that there was a talent he couldn't detect, so he'd decided that there was no such talent. For all Honrita knew, the man could be right. It was possible the idea of Sight magic was a ruse of some kind, but it didn't really matter. Her Blending would not be needing Sight magic, not once they had control of a High Blending.

  "I want all of you to think of ways we can use to gain access to the palace," Honrita said, firmly changing the subject. "I went by there yesterday, just to take a quick look around, and discovered that no one was being admitted without an appointment. In order to reach a High Blending we need to be inside the palace, so - "

  "There are any number of ways into the palace," Ayl interrupted, that faint smile back on his face again. "You can all apply for jobs, or go in as maintenance people of some sort, or even use your talent on the guardsmen. Aren't those enough options for you, Dama Grohl?"

  "They would be, except for one or two small problems," Honrita replied, gazing at Ayl with the most neutral expression she could manage. "After all the times your former followers entered the palace as workers, no one is hired or even allowed through the front entrance until they've been thoroughly investigated. As for using our talent to gain entrance, a number of the guardsmen are Middle practitioners of Spirit magic themselves. Those people are on the alert for anyone trying to influence the rest of the guardsmen, so acting alone is out. If we use our Blending to influence those people, we can't walk inside. If you Blend, you can't walk around. If you want to walk around, you can't Blend."

  "Must I do all the creative thinking myself?" Ayl put after a long moment, that smile still there but a bit more distant. "If it becomes absolutely necessary, we'll simply wait for one of the Blending members to come out to us."

  "How are we supposed to tell a Blending member from any other High talent?" Honrita countered, beginning to get a bit of pleasure from taunting Ayl. "I'm sure you can tell the difference, so please share the method with the rest of us."

  "The difference is easily seen, less easily described," Ayl said after another long moment, only the suggestion of a smile left to him. "When the time comes, I'll point out the desired target."

  "Why won't we be able to simply take someone over and ask?" Kadri Sumlow put, looking back and forth between Honrita and Ayl. "Getting the answer from someone who knows what we need to find out would take the guesswork out of the effort, wouldn't you agree?"

  Honrita watched Ayl stiffen at Sumlow's patronizing tone, and pleasure touched her again. Ayl seemed to be used to people falling all over themselves to worship him, just as she had pretended to do at first. But worship, she'd discovered, was extremely boring, whereas baiting seemed to be a never-ending enjoyment. As long as she used her talent to keep from going too far, there was no real need to be bored.

  "There, you see?" Honrita said to a still-silent Ayl with an open smile. "When you ask the right people for suggestions, you tend to get what you need. I can see now why you chose these people, Dom Ayl."

  "Yes, I did choose them, didn't I," Ayl said, as though he were thinking out loud. "They are, in effect, my creatures, and what one of mine does is merely an extension of my own efforts. The matter is now clear to me, and I approve."

  Ayl sat looking as though he certainly did approve, and Honrita caught the glances exchanged among the others. She'd made sure to tell her people about Ayl's madness, and to explain that the man was needed to put them in power. Once they were successful, he would no longer be needed. Ayl had told Honrita that he'd chosen the strongest Middle talents in the city for his own private Blending, and that Honrita did believe.

  "So that point is settled," Honrita said, looking around at everyone with the same pleasant, open smile. "When the time comes, we'll have no trouble finding the ones we want. Taking over even one High talent will give us the rest of them through the efforts of our puppet, and then we'll have them walk us into the palace. Does anyone see a problem with that plan?"

  "Not with that one, no," Stelk Faron said, his stiff disapproval still very much in evidence. "I must, however, return to the problem of our fifth member. His recovery is taking much too long, and we must do something to hasten it."

  "If I were able to get closer to him, I might be able to help out with that," Kadri Sumlow said with a thoughtful look coloring her haughty attitude. "I am, after all, a much better healer than the one treating him. I simply can't do my best from
a distance."

  "She shouldn't be expected to work at a distance," Seeli Tandor stated, showing just as much haughtiness as Sumlow had. "Using her talent in such an unproductive way is tantamount to wasting it."

  "Since our fifth is up and about, there's no reason why Dama Sumlow and I can't go and visit him," Honrita said as though considering an idea that hadn't come to her sooner. "I'm sure I can … convince him to let another healer work on him, and that way he can be among us more quickly."

  The others murmured immediate agreement, not to mention approval of the idea. Honrita had saved the suggestion specifically for the meeting, to show everyone who the real leader of the group was. Ayl hadn't made a single useful suggestion, but she, on the other hand, had come off looking rather well.

  Honrita glanced at Ayl, and was somewhat surprised to see his usual faint smile. The man should have been annoyed, but instead he was feeling extremely pleased about something. And even as Honrita watched, the pleasure inside him was … submerged, somehow, as though it had never been. If she hadn't been watching so closely with her talent, she would have missed knowing anything at all about the emotion.

  It took only a moment of thought for Honrita to realize that Ayl had plans he hadn't mentioned to her or anyone else. Honrita had found another Guild member, one who was as high up as Ayl used to be, and discovered that she couldn't put the man under her control. Her talent seemed to … flow past the man, which meant that nothing she'd tried - or wanted to try - with Ayl affected him.

  That made for something of a problem, but one that would continue only until she had a Blending of her own to work with. Not even Ayl would be able to resist a Blending entity, and then she would find out what the madman was up to. He obviously thought he could escape her just retribution, but that would not be happening.

  She would get even for everything done and not done, she would!