I wanted to say something like, “It’s a trade secret,” but even I have limits beyond which I won’t go.
Teldra said, “Goddess, it was the Jenoine.”
Verra nodded, slowly. “Yes,” she said. “It had to be. Do you know who? Or which faction?”
“I was unable to learn, Goddess. I can tell you that one addressed the other by the honorific ‘ker.’”
“Well done, Issola. It is a term used by what among the Jenoine is the equivalent of the military. It is useful information.”
“I am only too happy to be of service,” she said.
The Demon Goddess narrowed her eyes a little at this pronouncement, and said to me, “And you, little Easterner. Are you, also, only too happy to be of service?”
“I haven’t decided yet,” I said. “How many places can you be at once?”
“Well,” she said. “You’ve been studying. Sethra Lavode, I take it?”
I grunted. “Yes, but I knew that much, at least, from a long time ago.”
“Many,” said the Goddess, in answer to my question. “Bui there is one place I cannot be, and your countrymen are responsible for that.”
“An ancestor?”
“No. It was a blood prince, and you are of peasant stock.”
That stung. “All right,” I said. “Thanks for the compliment I still want to know.”
“I cannot appear among the Jenoine, Vlad, which is what you’re really asking, isn’t it?”
“Supernatural powers, immortality, and clever, too.”
“Don’t try my patience, Fenarian. I mean that.”
I swallowed and nodded.
“Goddess,” said Teldra, presumably breaking in to take me off the hook, “our friends are being held captive. Can you and will you help us?”
“Sit down here at my feet,” she said, “and we’ll talk.”
Teldra sat on the dais as if there was nothing distasteful about doing so; I did my best to emulate her but I don’t think I managed to keep the scowl entirely off my face.
“Speak,” said Verra, and Teldra did so. I occasionally filled in a detail or speculation. Verra remained silent the entire time. She must have known some of what was going on, to judge from her comment about my being there to assassinate her, but she just listened and gave no hint about what she had known.
“There is more to this,” said the Goddess when we were finished, “than you are aware of.”
“No shit?” I said.
She gave me an indulgent smile, which did nothing to improve my mood. I felt Teldra’s hand on my arm; if it had been anyone else, I’d probably have bit it.
Verra said, “I do not, however, intend to explain everything to you.”
“Well, there’s a new experience for me.”
“Little Easterner,” said Verra, “you seem determined to express your displeasure to me in more and more obvious ways until I take notice. Very well, I take notice. You are wroth with me because I have used you; because I have offended against your innate right to be a useless cyst on the hindquarters of life. Yes, well, you may continue to be wroth with me, because I intend to continue making you useful. You may attempt to kill me, in which case I will destroy you; or may continue to annoy me; in which case I will cause you sufficient pain to make you stop; or you may shut up and accept the inevitable.”
I opened my mouth, Teldra squeezed my arm, I shut my mouth.
“Say, ‘Thank you, Teldra,’” said Verra.
“Thank you Teldra,” I said.
“Boss, where did this self-destructive streak come from?”
“Shut up, Loiosh.”
Verra said, “I have been waiting for some time, and so has Sethra, for the Jenoine to put their plans in motion, without knowing exactly what form they would take, or, indeed, what those plans were. But we knew they were preparing something. Now they have begun, and we are only able to respond and react until we know more about their intentions.”
I said, “Sethra once tried to explain to me about offensive-|defensive strat—”
“Keep still,” she said, and I suddenly felt like someone was I driving a spike into my head. I gasped, and the pain went away.
“Very convincing,” I said, when I could speak again.
“They have made the first move,” said Verra, as if nothing had happened. “We don’t yet know what it means. The Jenoine are, in some ways, not unlike the Yendi; they will have anticipated our response, and worked it into their plans. They will have secondary and tertiary responses to our moves. Their objective will be concealed under layers of illusion and misdirection.”
I bit back a suggestion that she let me know when she had the problem wrapped up; I was learning. She continued, “There are some things, however, that we can be certain of: one is that they must find a way to neutralize Sethra, Morrolan, and Aliera, among others whose names you don’t know.”
“They have two of them; why haven’t they killed them?”
“You know how hard it is to kill the wielder of a Great Weapon.”
“I remember a Jhereg who managed it, once.”
“So Morrolan told me. Yes, it can be done, by a judicious combination of sorcery, surprise, and more sorcery. But even then, had Morrolan not been returned to life, Blackwand would have continued to guard his soul. And it might have done far more than that; the Jhereg assassin was a fool. By now, Vlad, you should begin to understand something about the Great Weapons.”
That shut me up. I remembered some of the tricks those things can do. Once I had seen Aliera—but never mind.
“But can they continue to hold Morrolan and Aliera captive?”
“It seems they can. I hadn’t thought so, and I still don’t know how.”
“Probably with help from the Serioli,” I suggested.
She actually looked startled. At least, she sat back in her chair and stared at me. That was twice in the same conversation; I felt smug.
“Well, well,” she said after a moment. “You know more than I should have thought.”
I shrugged.
“Yes, it may be the Serioli,” she agreed. She frowned, and seemed lost in thought. It flashed through my mind that I had never before seen her lost in thought, and the idea of that powerful mind bending its energies in some direction made me feel more puny and pathetic than all the pyrotechnics she had displayed before. What was I doing here, anyway?
“Don’t you remember, Boss? You’re going to kill her.”
“Oh, right. That.”
Verra finished her thought. “It is complex,” she announced. “They are playing a deep game, and there is no way to understand all of it at this stage.”
I stared at the ceiling, which was white, and very high over my head. I said, “Isn’t it a pain when you have to come up with a plan based on incomplete information?” No one responded. I said, “Goddess, do you have a guess about what killing you has to do with it? I mean did they think I actually could, and would, or was it just a complex piece of subterfuge?”
She said, “Oh, anything they can do to make me uncomfortable is all to the good, as far as they’re concerned; it may be nothing more than that. If it is part of something deeper, then I don’t know what. Yes, it is very possible that they expected you to march in here and kill me. Or perhaps they hope merely to confuse me, and hinder my efficiency.”
“‘The ways of the gods are mysterious,’” I quoted.
“Yes.”
“Also annoying, capricious—”
Teldra gave my arm a squeeze, and I shut up.
“Goddess,” said Teldra. “Can you tell us what we are to do?”
“What to do?” she said. “In order to accomplish what? In order to serve whom? Me? Aliera? Morrolan? Sethra?”
“I was thinking of the Serioli,” I said. “At least, no Serioli has ever annoyed me. That makes them unique on the list.”