Chapter 7

DALLIN FOUND Jagger in his office, head in hands.

"I was just about to send Seward to find you." Jagger leaned back and flung his pen down. "I spent a rather... interesting afternoon with Ambassador Einin's man."

If he hadn't already been aware of today's odd happenings, Jagger's grimace alone would have been enough to tell Dallin the meeting hadn't gone well--at least from Jagger's end. "So I hear. I've just been down to Orman's cell." Dallin flung out a hand. "What the deuce happened? Surely he wasn't like that when you brought him in?"

"Oh no, not by a long stretch."

"And how'd the Dominion get here so quickly? I would have thought we wouldn't have to deal with them for another day, at least. And in person. Have they spies we don't know about?"

"Not so far as I can tell."

Dallin chewed his lip. "Was this ambassador's lackey on the road already or something, then? Did Corliss go for nothing?"

"Depends on your perspective, I guess. Corliss didn't get her overnight away after all, though." Jagger shook his head with a long brooding sigh. "She tells me the ambassador had his offices hopping thirty seconds after my request left her hand. Wouldn't wait for a post, but insisted she escort his man back here straightaway." He frowned. "Oddly, the man was all ready and saddled up, like he was waiting for her."

Dallin frowned too. "Well, what happened? Surely they found no fault--"

"Oh, painfully polite, this one, and careful to thank us for a job well done, but... I don't know. There was something behind the man's eyes I didn't like. I don't know what happened downstairs. I swear I saw nothing strange, not even a twitch of a finger, but one look at this Siofra fellow--that's the ambassador's emissary--one look at him, and Orman fell to blubbering and gibbering." Jagger shifted in obvious unease. "I don't mind telling you, it made my skin want to crawl right off my bones."

"Woodrow says conjuring."

Jagger waved that away impatiently. "Woodrow's just wet out of the fields and thinks an eclipse is conjuring. Although I won't deny the possibility. That's what shamans are for, and they at least got Orman to shut up."

"So well that he's gone mute! And if there's anything going on behind that blank stare, it's--"

"Not the doing of the shaman," Jagger assured him. "The sense went out of the man the moment we stepped into the room--I saw it happen." He wrinkled his nose as though he smelled something foul. "Like the mere set of the man's beady little ferret eyes did Orman in." Dallin was uncomfortably reminded of his own reaction when he'd first laid eyes on Calder. He blinked it away when Jagger went on, "You'll just have to use the statement I squeaked out of him, I expect. Fairly cut and dry, at any rate. He admitted to everything. Several times."

Dallin found his teeth clenching. "It's all a little neat, innit?" He didn't like any of it. A growing sense of alarm and suspicion was vibrating unpleasantly over his skin.

Jagger only shrugged. "Anyway, you'll like this--that Siofra, he doesn't want Orman back. Says he committed a crime against Cynewisan and should pay whatever price Cynewisan demands. He was especially careful to point out that, should Cynewisan's price be blood, the Dominion--oh, do pardon me, Riocht--would not be displeased."

"It'll make things a bit easier, I expect," Dallin offered grudgingly.

"Likely. But that wasn't the whole of it." Jagger peered up at Dallin, sardonic. "He wants Calder."

Dallin's teeth clenched again. "I *knew* it." With effort he turned a growl into an annoyed sigh on its way out of his throat. "What's he done?"

"That's the thing. Apparently nothing, or at least nothing they'll admit to. You see, if he's wanted for a crime, according to the latest treaty, the extradition would have to go through the Citadel in Penley. A quorum would have to view all the evidence and decide whether or not they want to let them take him. It would take months." Jagger's mouth lifted in a sour smirk. "On the other hand, if he were, say, their Chosen, and he'd gone and run away from home...."

Dallin's legs almost went out from under him. "You're joking."

"I wish I were." Jagger ran a hand through his thinning hair. "In truth I'm surprised they even told us as much. Shifty lot, they are. Although I expect they've nothing to worry about--we've no way to verify any of it. No one lays eyes on this Chosen but for once a year, and then it's from the Guild's turrets. He could be anyone." He growled. "This... honesty, cooperation, polite compliance, whatever it is--it isn't like them. I don't trust them, especially not after what happened downstairs. If Calder's a criminal, why not just take the time to extradite him? And if he's this Chosen, why tell us? Apparently even their own people don't know he's missing."

"There's... yes," Dallin agreed slowly. "You'd think they'd just kidnap him and have done." It wasn't as though it hadn't happened before. They were a little too good at the sneakier bits of diplomacy.

Damn. Dallin had known there was trouble hanging over Calder's head like a black cloud, but this....

"That's more their method, yes, and I expect they might've done," Jagger said wearily. "Except when I sent Corliss out to Ramsford's to collect him, he'd already hied off."

It just kept getting worse. Dallin shook his head. "Gone?"

"Gone. And word from our ambassador is that we are to use any means necessary to find the man and deliver him safely into Einin's hands. Or Siofra's hands, more like, seeing as how he's gone and dug in at the Kymberly and looks to be staying until he's got his Chosen back. I'm sorry you missed him. I would've liked to know if you saw something I couldn't, because I can't for the life of me figure out how one such as him managed a position as powerful as his. Eager, pompous little shit, him. All hot and bothered, beady little eyes agleam. I swear I thought he was going to mess his trousers, right up until Corliss got back to say Calder'd flown. *Then* he showed his colors, all imperious and officious." Jagger blew out a breath between clenched teeth. "Little shit. I don't like it, but we've no choice. It seems the progress of the talks in Penley depends entirely upon our ability to bend over and smile--or so that axe-faced, thin-necked, squawky ambassador's weasel would have me believe, and our man backs him." Jagger's head dropped back into his hands, the same pose as when Dallin had walked in. "Who'd've thought the peace of our little corner of the world would hinge on that skinny little catamite."

"I don't think he was," Dallin murmured absently, then wondered why he'd said it and shut his mouth.

Jagger didn't call him on it, though, only looked up and shrugged. "Didn't even wait for the purse he was owed, says Ramsford. Two weeks' pay due him tomorrow, but from what we can figure, directly after he was released from here, he skulked back to the Kymberly's stables, snapped up whatever was his, and took to his feet." He waved a hand. "Lucky for us he didn't steal one of the horses, so he'll be on foot. Ramsford was very insistent that we record somewhere that he took nothing that wasn't his and left without a two-week purse that was."

"Brilliant," Dallin muttered. "An honest skiver. I suppose they want us to--" He stopped, closed his eyes, and groaned. "Oh no."

"Oh yes," Jagger said. "Your case, your man. And keep this closer than close--no one's to know who this man is but you and me. The extradition papers are on Elmar's desk. As soon as you find him, he's Putman's property and your responsibility until you get him back here and hand him over to the Guild." He gave Dallin a tired shrug and a rueful grimace. "You'd best get along before the trail runs cold."