The Tyrant's Law (Dagger and the Coin)

sense that they were equals, two men speaking as men instead of a dusty petitioner before the guiding hand of the Antean Empire. Geder envied him his certainty and disliked him.
    “You want me to fund a mission to … where?”
    Cinlama smiled.
    “If I was sure of that, it would already be too late. Someone would already have found it.”
    “It?”
    “What there is to be found. The Temple of the Sun. The Salt Scrolls. The lost books of Erindau.”
    “Those were forgeries,” Geder said, pouncing too quickly. Cinlama smiled.
    “The ones presented so far have been. The true ones are still out there. That’s the thought, isn’t it? My father and his spent their lives in the lost places where the dragon’s roads don’t go. I’ve climbed caverns mankind hadn’t touched in centuries and found carved stone at the bottom. There’s mysteries out there still. Treasures going back all the way to the Dragon Empire. Gems and jewels. Books of knowledge and magic. Devices from the war we don’t even remember except in stories we tell the kids to get them to sleep.”
    “And you know how to find these marvels.” Geder loaded the words with skepticism.
    “I know how to look. Finding’s a gamble, but if it pays out, there’s no higher prize.”
    No was already on his lips when Geder glanced over at Basrahip. The minister’s eyes were wide, his brows lifted. The pretense of prayer and contemplation were gone, and in their place something that could have been alarm or delight. Geder swallowed his refusal and waited, but Basrahip neither nodded nor shook his head.
    “Um,” Geder said. “I will have to consider my answer.”
    “My thanks for that, Lord Regent,” Cinlama said, smiling.
    Geder leaned toward his guard captain. “See him somewhere safe. And don’t let him leave.”
    The captain nodded, but there was a hesitation in it.
    “You mean the gaol, my lord?”
    “No. A guesthouse. Or put him in one of the gardens. Just … just don’t let him leave.”
    After that, Geder heard a shepherd asking recompense for his flock, slaughtered by a drunken priest, but by then the joy had gone out of it. He called the halt and withdrew, his guard walking ahead and behind. He stopped at a dry fountain, a copper dragon almost lost to verdigris throwing itself toward the sky, the bodies of the thirteen races of humanity drawn along behind it. Or, looked at differently, pulling it down. Basrahip came shortly thereafter, his face pinched in thought.
    “You heard something?” Geder said. “The adventurer. You … I mean, do you think he means what he says?”
    “He does,” the priest said. “He did not mislead you, Prince Geder. He seeks what he claims to seek. I would speak with him, if I might.”
    Geder pulled his hands into his sleeves, warming his fingers with the ends like mittens.
    “I thought as much. I had the guard take him somewhere comfortable and hold him.”
    “You are good to us,” Basrahip said, but he seemed distracted. “This man’s errand may be of importance. For time beyond time, the dragons have envied and hated the goddess. If buried shells survived the fire years, we must know. His coming may be the hand of the goddess in the world.”
    “Oh,” Geder said. “Then you think I should accept his petition?”
    Basrahip put a thick hand on Geder’s shoulder.
    “I will speak with him and know more. The goddess’s web is wide as the world and deeper than oceans. Nothing escapes her notice. If he is indeed sent by her, we must honor him.”
    “I suppose we will, then,” Geder said. “If the conversation goes the way you hope.”
    “My thanks, Prince Geder.”
    “I’m chosen by the goddess to bring peace to the world. Really, whatever she says needs to be done, we should do it,” he said.
    For the most part, he meant it. The little tug of reluctance was only caution and a rational skepticism. They were in the early stages of a war, after all. They might need to buy food or mercenaries, and if the coin was already spent, that would mean levying taxes or borrowing. So it was best to be certain. He was Lord Regent of Antea. He was the most powerful man in the world. This Dar Cinlama was a wanderer and a beggar, and if Basrahip was enthusiastic about him, it was only because the Dartinae man might be an apt tool for Geder’s projects. That was all. Of all people in the world, Geder told himself, surely he had the least reason to be jealous.

Marcus
    N o one knew how long the dragons had