Tiassa Read Online Free PDF Page A

I’ll be learning more quickly. But I only nodded.
    “I’ve been doing what I do for, well, since the end of the Interregnum.”
    I nodded, waiting; I had no intention of giving him the satisfaction. But then he waited, and then he raised an eyebrow, so I sighed inwardly and said, “All right. What is it you do?”
    “I rob people.”
    “You rob people.”
    “Yes. I hold my sword at their throats, and require them to give me their money. They oblige, and I send them on their way.”
    “Is that honest?”
    “No one’s ever asked me before. I’ll think about it and get back to you.”
    “Thanks. So, how can an honest businessman like me be of service to a dangerous highwayman like yourself?”
    “I was told you think you’re funny. That’s all right, I think I’m funny, too.”
    “What else were you told?”
    “That you have ways of learning things no one can understand, that you practice the Eastern sorcery—”
    “Witchcraft.”
    “Hmm?”
    “We call it witchcraft.”
    “Right. And you also dabble in the more traditional sorcery. And that you’ve gotten lucky often enough that it probably isn’t luck.”
    I tried to think of who he might have spoken with who would have given him that sort of report, but it was a pointless exercise so I stopped. “All right,” I said. “What can someone with my skills do for someone in your profession?”
    “You also have influence, and you know a lot of people.”
    I didn’t say yes, or no, or nod, or shake my head. In fact, I had no idea what he was talking about, but if he was operating under some sort of illusion about me, it might work to my advantage.
    He glanced at Ibronka, who was leaning back and studying me while, I’m sure, holding his hand under the table; they were probably also talking psychically. He said, “Things have been getting more difficult over the years.”
    “In what way?” That seemed neutral enough.
    “More and more use of sorcery to maintain the safety of the roads, and to learn the identity of those of us who violate it. People with large sums or valuable jewels teleport instead of traveling by road, or if they have to travel, they teleport most of the money, so all we can take is what they have to travel with.”
    “Sorcery,” I said. “Bad stuff.” About which I knew fairly little. He was right earlier when he said I dabbled.
    “Inconvenient, in any case. And it’s getting worse. Now it’s becoming difficult to find clients safely.”
    I laughed. “Clients,” I said. “I like that. I like that a lot.”
    He permitted himself a smirk. “Yeah, me, too.”
    “I’m missing the part where I can be helpful.”
    “I usually operate in an area to the east of here.”
    “Ah. I start to see.”
    “No, no. Not that far east.”
    “Oh, all right.” My anger receded quickly, because it hadn’t had time to work itself up, but I still missed half of his next statement. “Sorry, say that again?”
    “I said they’re starting to tag the money.”
    “Tag?”
    “That’s what they call it. Sorcerously mark it.”
    “So it can be identified as stolen?”
    “Yes.”
    “Hmm. That doesn’t seem fair.”
    “That’s how I feel about it.”
    “How are they—”
    “They’ve set up places where you can have your money tagged, so if it’s stolen, a sorcerer can identify it. I was lucky enough to learn about it before servicing a client who’d done that. Now that we know what to look for, we can tell, but it’s getting common enough that we’ve had to let some prime targets go.”
    “You have my sympathy,” I said. “What happens when the proper owner tries to spend it?”
    “The tagging is tied to him, so he just rubs it off.”
    “What if he forgets?”
    “A merchant gets in trouble, I suppose.”
    “And it’s cheap to put on?”
    “Very. They do it by volume, so with gold it costs next to nothing.”
    “Sounds unfortunate.”
    “Right. So … why am I coming to you?”
    “I was just getting to that