‘Yes, that sounds like his usual way of doing things.’
‘Perhaps, but it’s still inappropriate,’ Bahamus said. ‘I’ll have a word with Alma and Sarque and try to discourage them from supporting anything similar in future.’ He paused. ‘How exactly did you convince Undaaris to change his mind?’
Undaaris was just entering the room. He walked straight to where his aide was sitting, a mage named Lyle. The two of them spoke briefly: Lyle looked at me, then they headed for the door. ‘I reminded him of a prior discussion,’ I said, watching Undaaris go. ‘Must have changed his mind.’
‘Apparently it did,’ Bahamus said, eyeing me. ‘Do you think it’ll stick?’
‘That’s always the question with Undaaris, isn’t it?’ I said. Levistus appeared in the doorway to the corridor. ‘Oh, excuse me a moment. Thanks again.’
Levistus saw me coming and paused, waiting for me to approach. ‘Councillor,’ I said to him with a nod.
Levistus watched me without expression. ‘Is there something you need?’
‘Actually, I was hoping you could pass on a message to your aide Barrayar.’ I kept my tone friendly, but the expression in my eyes was another matter. ‘Tell him the next time he has an issue with me, come settle it himself instead of sending a boy to do a man’s job.’
‘I’m afraid I have no idea what you mean.’ Levistus glanced down at my pocket. ‘That data focus you were playing with looks similar to the one that was recovered in the White Rose case.’
‘Does it?’
‘The penalties for appropriating such a piece of evidence would be severe.’
‘These focuses all look so similar.’
‘Apparently they do.’ Levistus stepped around me. ‘Goodbye, Verus.’
‘Goodbye, Councillor,’ I said to Levistus’s retreating back. He didn’t turn to look at me, and as he disappeared through the doorway I gave an inward sigh. And that’s another day.
3
‘So how did that even work?’ Variam asked.
We were sitting in the Hollow, a shadow realm linked to the Chilterns. It’s a small forested island, floating in a multicoloured sky, and right now, it’s our home. The stars were out, pinpoints of brilliant light shining down from above, and we were gathered around our camp-site, a circle of chairs in a clearing with dim sphere lights glowing in the darkness. The scents of grass and summer leaves were all around, and there was the occasional rustle of some creature moving in the undergrowth.
‘Remember that business with White Rose?’ I said. ‘When Vihaela joined up with Richard, she brought along a whole lot of blackmail material from the White Rose vault. My guess is that’s how she was able to partner up with Richard and Morden as equals.’
‘I remember now,’ Luna said. She was dressed more formally than she once would have, in a nice blouse and a skirt; she’d come straight from work. ‘That was how Morden got his seat on the Council.’
I nodded. ‘And I did some sniffing around and heard some rumours that Undaaris might just be one of those mages with some awkward little secrets in the White Rose vault. So I had a chat with him over the winter and dropped some hints. His reaction pretty much confirmed it.’
‘But we don’t have any of that stuff,’ Variam said. Like Luna, he was in his business clothes. He’d been in Keeper HQ all day, and had been the last to hear the news. ‘What, they think Morden just shares that kind of thing around?’
‘That’s exactly what they think,’ I said. ‘Remember, they think Anne and I signed up with Morden willingly. The way they see it, I was Morden’s aide, so I was on his side. So it’s really not a big step for them to assume I’d have access to his files.’ I shrugged. ‘As long as they’re going to assume the worst of us, we might as well take advantage.’
‘You can’t open that data focus.’
‘Undaaris doesn’t know that. But I guess it had been long enough since our last chat that he was starting to wonder if maybe I didn’t really have anything after all. So when Levistus came to him, he probably figured that this might be a way to get rid of the problem.’
‘Jesus.’ Variam sat back in his chair. ‘It was all a bluff?’
‘I raised; he folded,’ I said. ‘It’s not as bad as you think. There’s really no way for Undaaris to be sure that I don’t have access. I mean, what’s he going to do, ask Morden himself?’
‘It still doesn’t seem that great a position though,’ Luna said. ‘I mean, from what you say, Levistus has three votes on the Council pretty much locked up. All he needs is for one more person to change their mind.’
‘There are rules against resubmissions.’ I shrugged. ‘But basically, yeah, I’m hanging by a thread. What else is new?’
‘So what’s the plan?’ Variam asked.
The four of us had been meeting like this for a long time. Somehow or other, Variam, Luna, Anne and I had become a team, and at some point, without ever actually saying it out loud, we’d just started taking for granted that if there was a problem, we’d get together to deal with it. Two years ago, we would have been meeting in my Camden flat; one year ago, it would have been Arachne’s cave. But my flat had been burned down, and while Arachne’s cave was the closest thing I had left to a family home, it was less and less safe for me to visit. The Hollow was the first place we’d had for a long time that was safe. Shadow realms are hard to break into, and we’d done a lot of work to make this one even more so. It didn’t have the amenities of a house in the city, but it was worth the trade-off. It’s hard to explain just how big a relief it is to be able to go to sleep without worrying that someone will break in and kill you before you wake up.
‘Actually, I was hoping to get some ideas from you guys,’ I said. ‘I’ve got some long-term stuff going with Arachne, but as far as dealing with the Council goes, I’m holding my own, but not much more. I’m open to suggestions.’
The three of them looked at each other, but this time, neither Variam nor Luna spoke up. ‘What about Spire?’ Anne asked.
Unlike the other two, Anne had already been in the Hollow when I arrived. She spends the most time in it out of any of the four of us, and I sometimes think she seems more comfortable here than she does in London. She hadn’t said much until now, but then she usually doesn’t. ‘The seventh member of the Council,’ Anne said. ‘You said he’s supposed to represent independents.’
‘He’s also a recluse,’ I said. ‘Doesn’t show up most of the time, and usually abstains when he does.’
‘But if you could get him on your side, you’d have the numbers in your favour,’ Luna said.
‘Well, it’s worth a try. Though I’ve got the feeling that everyone else on the Council must have already tried the same thing.’
‘I’ve got a question,’ Variam said. ‘How come you didn’t know about this meeting until so late?’
‘Because they were keeping it from me.’
‘Yeah,’ Variam said. ‘But to call the meeting, they had to call every other member of the Council. And then all of them would have called their aides. And the guards, and the clerks, and everyone else.’
‘What are you getting at?’
‘You don’t think maybe you should have someone to help you with this stuff?’
I sighed. We’d had this discussion before. ‘It’s not as simple as that.’
‘Actually, it kind of is,’ Variam said. ‘If you’d had an aide the way all the other Council members do, you might have heard a bit earlier.’