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  "That's one of the reasons why we're here, Tal," Dinno answered with an odd and unexplained gentleness. "We wanted you to know that you'll be returned to your family in just a little while."

  "It's about time," Zirdon said, triumph flashing through him. In just a little while he'd be back with his family, and then he'd be able to start getting even with those who had insulted him so badly. He knew exactly how his revenge would go, and as weariness began to take him over, Zirdon was able to picture the time. It was a very pleasant picture, and he never noticed when the picture abruptly faded to unrelieved black…

  Thrybin Korge walked along the street in the shadows, looking for a carriage to hire. His back had begun to throb more vigorously, and he wanted nothing more than to get home and lie down. After a good sleep he would put the first of his plans in motion, the plans that would make him the ultimate leader of the empire. It had come to him that he didn't need to be part of a Blending himself to begin with. He simply needed to control a Blending at first, one that would take over everything for him. After that he'd be free to find the perfect Blendingmates, preferably the best looking women of strength in the empire…

  A smile curved Thrybin's lips as he walked, an acknowledgment of the truth he'd inadvertently come upon. When he chose Blendingmates they would be all women, thereby making him the major talent again. After all, how could a woman be a true major talent? She couldn't be, of course, and everyone would know that as well as he knew the fact himself…

  "Good evening, esteemed sir," a voice came, a soft and interesting voice. "Would you care for some dinner - and evening - company?"

  The woman who stepped out of the shadows was very attractive, much more so than the average woman who offered herself on the streets. Her smile would have raised Thrybin's interest immediately at another time, but at the moment he wasn't even able to regret the missed opportunity.

  "The only thing I can use right now is a carriage," Thrybin answered, pausing with one hand against a building to rest. "Go and find one for me, girl, and you'll have earned a few coppers the easy way."

  "I know an easier way to earn more than coppers, Exalted One," the girl answered with an odd smile. "You are a member of the assembly, aren't you?"

  "Of course I am," Thrybin said, flattered that the girl actually seemed to recognize him. "But I don't understand what you meant - "

  Thrybin's question was interrupted by the sound of shouting behind him, and he turned with a bit of difficulty to see what looked like some of Mismin's guardsmen running and gesturing. So they'd discovered that he'd escaped…

  "Those men are undoubtedly coming after me, but they won't catch me," Thrybin told the woman hurriedly. "If you keep me out of their hands, there's silver in it for you."

  "There are more of them coming from the other way, but you're right, Exalted One," the woman said as she stepped closer to Thrybin. "They may catch me, but they certainly won't get their hands on you."

  Relief and triumph flooded through Thrybin as he realized that he'd outsmarted his enemies again. He'd use this girl to get him away and hidden until the guardsmen were gone, and then he'd continue on with his plans. Nothing could stop him, absolutely nothing -

  Thrybin made a sound of pain when he felt the sharp stabbing in his chest, and the confusion was terrible. He had looked down to see a dagger sticking out of him, and even as he slipped to his knees he saw the girl who had stabbed him try to escape from the closing guardsmen. She had obviously thought she could run away from the two groups, but a third group appeared in her way. Then all three groups converged, and the girl was firmly in their custody.

  Good, Thrybin thought, not having noticed that he'd fallen to his side on the ground. They have her, so I'll be able to testify at her trial. But it's getting very dark now, so they'd better be quick about fetching a healer. I need a healer again, because I can't die now. I can't die when I'm so close, I can't, I just can't… I can't… I -

  Chapter Fifteen

  The day was windy and a bit cooler than Sembrin Noll would have liked, but not even pouring rain or mounds of snow could have ruined the day entirely. Sembrin was out of that house with no one but Jost Feriun, his guard commander, as escort, and the feeling of freedom was so heady that someone might have thought he'd been drinking.

  But for the last day and a half, Sembrin hadn't had more than an occasional sip of wine to drink. After somehow getting free of the control Bensia and the children had had on him, he'd realized that his only hope of staying free was to pretend that nothing had changed. It had been a terrible struggle to make himself actually feel as unconcerned and satisfied as he'd been when under control, but he'd managed it because he'd had to.

  And Bensia had apparently been taken in completely. The vile woman had smiled to herself and ignored him, and the children had done the same sort of ignoring they'd been indulging in for years. They all went about their business without giving him a second thought, showing only indulgent smiles when he took "Bensia" to their bedchamber for what was supposed to be pleasure. The only pleasure involved, however, had been the opportunity to relax for a while…

  "We're almost there, my lord," Feriun murmured, bringing Sembrin out of his thoughts. "One of our men will be setting up on the corner just beyond this alley."

  Sembrin nodded without speaking, the stench in the alleyway encouraging his silence. They'd left their horses some distance from where they now walked, and were in the process of sneaking around in an effort to remain unseen. Sembrin had discovered that speaking put the fetid stink of the alleyway into his mouth, but speaking was really unnecessary. Feriun already knew that Sembrin meant for them to follow the mobs the men gathered, which would put them into the palace along with their men.

  A smile curved Sembrin's lips as he remembered that Bensia waited at the house to be told that they'd been successful. The miserable woman had smiled triumphantly as Sembrin left the house, certainly expecting to be escorted into the palace once it was firmly in their hands. Sembrin meant to have her taken to the palace, all right, but not with the children behind her and not with an escort. Chains would look particularly good on Bensia, especially once she'd been stripped naked…

  "Ah, the men are about to begin, my lord," Feriun said softly with relish, and Sembrin looked up to see that they'd stopped at the mouth of the alley. The corner they meant to watch was only a dozen steps away. Once their man climbed up onto the box he'd brought with him, it would be possible to see the man even if the crowd grew larger than they expected it to.

  "The other two men had better support the speaker if anyone in the crowd tries to give him trouble," Sembrin murmured, finding the air considerably fresher so close to the street. "Are the other two also prepared to take over if for some reason the speaker can't continue?"

  "All three know what's supposed to be said, so there shouldn't be a problem," Feriun murmured in return, and then the guard leader straightened. "Yes, it's time, so they're going to start."

  Sembrin felt a thrill of anticipation as he did his own straightening. All of the men, all over the city, would be starting their haranguing at the same time. In that way the various mobs formed would also be formed at the same time, making it much easier to gather the peasants into one large mob. The more peasants there were to hide among and behind, the better off Sembrin and his men would be.

  The speaker had stepped up onto the box he'd brought with him, and a few curious passersby had already paused to find out what was going on.

  "I'm here to tell you the truth!" the speaker shouted, looking around at everyone in sight. "If you have the nerve to hear the truth, come closer and listen!"

  There were a lot of raised brows and exchanged glances among the peasants on the street, but most of those who had heard the speaker did come closer to where he stood.

  "Do you people have any idea how unhappy most of your neighbors are under the new government?" the speaker demanded once he had an attentive audience. "You've all been told that life is bet
ter now that the nobles are gone, but is life really better? Don't you all know someone who didn't get that job he or she wanted, or someone who tried to speak up about the unfairness all around? Until now those who tried to speak out have been arrested and thrown out of the city, but it's more than time that you all heard the truth."

  A mutter ran through the slowly growing crowd, a sound that meant the peasants were beginning to respond to the speaker. Sembrin tasted the feelings of the crowd and found them to be uncertain, which was really an excellent start.

  "The truth is that the new government is out to help itself, not any of you!" the speaker shouted, pointing at the crowd as he spoke. "Getting rid of the nobles should have made us all rich, but has it? How many of you have gotten your share of the gold left behind by the people who had it all? I haven't seen any gold, and the government wants to keep it that way!"

  "There's something wrong that I just can't put my finger on," Feriun said as the crowd muttered again, only louder. "More and more people keep coming over, but there's something - "

  "Don't be a fool, Feriun," Sembrin snapped, hating the way the man always tried to ruin things that were going well. "My talent tells me that those people are starting to get angry, and angry is the way we want them. What could be wrong in that?"

  Feriun simply shook his head, proving that Sembrin was wise to ignore him. Things were going just the way they were supposed to, and at this rate they would be in the palace in no time -

  "If the government gave us all the gold, what would they use to pay the farmers for the food we need?" a woman in the crowd suddenly shouted. "I don't know about you, but for me eating on a regular basis has become a habit."

  "If we had the gold, we could pay for our own food," the speaker returned almost at once, clearly ignoring the ripple of amusement that had gone through the crowd. "I don't know about you, but I'm not a child who can't look after himself."

  "You're going to pay for a city's worth of food all by yourself?" the woman came back with a sound of ridicule. "Just how much of that gold do you expect to get?"

  "I won't be the only one paying, so there won't be a problem," the speaker countered. "Or don't you think there are enough sensible people in this city to join me?"

  "Where does sensible enter into it?" the woman asked at once, again sounding ridiculing. "You'd need to get everyone together and collect their gold, then you'd need to get in touch with the farmers. Then you'd have to pay the farmers and make arrangements for the food to be shipped. We might get a bit hungry waiting for all that to be done, and while we're starving we might ask ourselves why we're bothering. The new government is already taking care of the matter, a lot more easily than we could."

  "You don't mind being enslaved as long as you have your meals on time?" the speaker scoffed, taking what Sembrin considered the proper attitude. "The point is that gold isn't the only thing being kept from us. The wonderful new government promised us new and better jobs if we did things their way, jobs that were supposed to lead to a better life all around. No one I know has seen a trace of that better life, and I'm willing to bet that most of you haven't seen it either!"

  The muttering grew even louder, putting a faint smile on the face of the speaker. The man seemed to be confident that he had the crowd now, but as soon as the muttering died down a bit the woman spoke again.

  "Maybe you and your friends don't have a better life because you're more interested in stealing it than in working for it," the woman stated. "You want us to demand gold that we would then give to you, knowing in our hearts that you would never cheat us. Is that because you've done so much for us already?"

  Too many people in the crowd laughed at what the woman had said, a fact the speaker didn't miss. Sembrin saw his man's jaw tighten, and then the speaker gave one of his companions a small nod. One of the two men there to support and protect the speaker began to step forward to see to the woman, but suddenly there was a very large blond man standing beside the woman. The man who was supposed to support the speaker stopped short with what looked like confusion, and Sembrin heard Feriun curse under his breath.

  "That's Chelten Admis, one of the men who disappeared a few days ago," Feriun snarled, staring at the big blonde. "I don't know what he's doing here, but none of my three will try to take him. In spite of that easy grin the man is wearing, he won't hesitate to kill anyone who challenges him. I told you something felt wrong, but what does it mean?"

  Sembrin made no attempt to answer Feriun, primarily because he had no answer. He had no idea why his plans had suddenly started to go wrong, and then the woman in the crowd made things even worse.

  "I think you're so concerned about us because you work for one of the nobles still on the loose," the woman accused the speaker abruptly. "Since we all know how much the nobles cared about us, we now know why you care. And you were able to talk so knowingly about slaves because you have personal experience with the state. It takes a slave to be a willing running dog for a fool who refuses to understand that his time is now past. Why don't you bark for us so we can all see the real you?"

  The crowd laughed even harder, and Sembrin had no trouble feeling the panic his speaker experienced. Everything had gone terribly wrong, but getting to safety now had to be Sembrin's primary concern. After he'd hidden himself again he could take the time to figure out why his plan hadn't worked…

  "Let's get out of here," Feriun muttered, speaking Sembrin's already-made decision. "If those aren't city guardsmen heading for our men, I've never seen the breed. We don't need to be here to see the arrest, or whether the rest of our men get away. And we can't go back to that house where your wife is. Too many of the men know about it, and at least one of them is guaranteed to talk."

  Sembrin couldn't have cared less about Bensia's safety or lack of it in the house, so he nodded and began to turn with Feriun to retrace their steps through the alley. When Feriun stopped short Sembrin almost ran into him, but Sembrin's words of rebuke died before they were spoken. The reason for Feriun's abrupt halt was the presence of strangers behind them, people who looked far too amused for Sembrin's peace of mind.

  "Surely you aren't leaving the party already," a small woman said, all but smirking. "You've been wonderful guests so far, so good, in fact, that we won't hear of your leaving. We've been looking forward to having a long conversation with you, and we'd like to have that conversation now."

  "Unfortunately, madam, my friend and I have pressing business elsewhere," Sembrin said at once, ignoring the group of large men who stood behind the woman. "I'm sure you understand the problem, so please ask your companions to step aside and let us through. Going around the block will take far too long."

  As he spoke, Sembrin reached for the woman's mind. He intended to use his talent to take control of her, and then she could get all those men out of their way. It might be possible for him and Feriun to go out into the street and lose themselves in the crowd, but there was no need to do things the hard way. All Sembrin had to do was touch the woman's mind… touch it… touch -

  "Don't bother trying again, Sembrin," another voice drawled, this time a male voice. "I'm protecting the lady, so you haven't a chance of taking control."

  And then Edmin Ruhl stepped out from behind the very large men, a sight that made Sembrin's blood turn to ice. Edmin ought to be hiding in the deepest hole he could find - if not gone from the city or dead - but instead he was here, making no effort to disguise his identity…

  "That man is an escaped noble!" Sembrin blurted as he pointed, the only thing he could think of to say and do. "You have to take him into custody at once and turn him over to the authorities! There's bound to be an incredibly large reward for you all -"

  Sembrin's words broke off when he realized that the men facing him were laughing, just as though he'd told them a joke. Edmin was laughing as well, and Sembrin couldn't bear it.

  "I'm not lying, you fools!" he shouted, feeling the heat of embarrassment and anger in his face. "That man is an escaped
noble, so why aren't you arresting him?"

  "We aren't arresting the man because we were told you might say something like that," one of the large men informed Sembrin with a chuckle. "Accusing other people of what you are is an old trick, much too old for any of us to fall for it."

  The blood that had been so hot and uncomfortable in Sembrin's face suddenly drained away, leaving behind the ice felt earlier and most likely a matching pallor.

  "Well, I'm not an escaped noble, and some of you ought to know that," Feriun blustered while Sembrin stood silent and frightened. "I'm only an ordinary hired man who isn't responsible for what his employer does, so I'll just be on my way - "

  Feriun had started to turn back to the street, and Sembrin wondered what had caused the turncoat's words to break off. A glance over his shoulder showed another group of men blocking the way to the street, which perversely made Sembrin glad. Feriun had been willing enough to share in Sembrin's victory; making the fool share defeat instead was nothing more than justice.

  "You don't have to bother with throwing me out of the city," Sembrin said to the woman as he squared his shoulders. "I'm perfectly capable of leaving on my own, which I mean to do at once. Unless, of course, you happen to have room in your government for someone with my ability. I can be of more use to you than you can possibly imagine, and I won't ask more than a modest amount for my help. I can tell you - "

  "Oh, spare me," the woman interrupted, no longer looking in the least amused. "I'd sooner have a rat from the sewers working for me, and in a short while we'll know everything you know without having to pay you even a copper. But after that you won't be thrown out of the city, which I'm sure you already know. You'll be taking a trip out into the country to see old friends, just not our country. Arrest them now, please."

  A number of the large men began to step forward, but what really destroyed Sembrin was the look of delight on Edmin Ruhl's face. Somehow Ruhl had managed to protect himself, and the man's lack of worry showed that nothing Sembrin might say would cause Ruhl to be sent to Astinda with him. A scream began in Sembrin's throat and forced its way out of his mouth, but that didn't stop the large men from chaining him to a cursing Feriun.