Free Thraxas - The Complete Series by Martin Scott Page B

to be paid and palms to be greased—the Praetor for Guild Affairs, the Deputy Consul, Palace officials and who knows who else. Apparently it’s standard practice for the Consul’s Secretary to demand a ten-thousand-guran bribe before he lets an application go through.”
    “That’s going to add up to a lot of money.”
    “It does. And we’re going to need twice as much in bribe money because of the opposition from the True Church and all the other people who don’t want to see the Association of Gentlewomen make any advance. I heard the figure of fifty thousand mentioned. There aren’t many wealthy women in Turai. Even the ones that do run their own businesses have a hard time surviving because the guilds won’t admit them. Well, if they won’t let us in to the Bakers, Innkeepers, Transport or other Guilds, they’re going to have to face us on the Revered Federation Council when the Association of Gentlewomen gets its Charter.”
    “Who do you give the money to?”
    “Minarixa the Baker. She’s the local organiser. Care to make a contribution?”
    “What will the Association of Gentlewomen do for me?”
    “Get me off your back.”
    “Yes, well, maybe later, Makri.”
    “Why not now?”
    I look around anxiously. “The place is full of Barbarians and dock workers. If they see me giving money to the Association of Gentlewomen they’ll ridicule me half to death.”
    Makri sneers. I will give her some money later. Not right now though, not in public. I have an image to maintain.
    “You should have asked the Princess, Makri. She must have a lot of money.”
    “She hasn’t.”
    “How do you know?”
    “Because I heard at last night’s meeting that Lisutaris, Mistress of the Sky, already asked Du-Akai for some help.”
    “Lisutaris, Mistress of the Sky? She’s pretty senior in the Sorcerers Guild. Works at the Palace too. Is she involved in your group?”
    Makri nods. “All sorts of women are. But the Princess couldn’t make a donation. The King controls her money. And they don’t get on very well.”
    “I’m not surprised, if she lies to the King the same way she lied to me. I still wish I knew why she sent me to find that spell. Why would a Princess want to put a dragon to sleep? It’s not like it’s guarding anything. No reason to bother with it that I can see. Unless…”
    I break off, and stare into space.
    “Sudden Investigator’s intuition?” says Makri, slightly sarcastically.
    “That’s right. You might want to put a dragon to sleep to make it easier to kill.”
    “Why would Princess Du-Akai want to do that? It’s a present to her father. They don’t get on that badly.”
    “I’ve been wondering how all this fits together, Makri. In my experience, when various troubles descend on me, they generally turn out to be connected in some way or other. No one knows how the Red Elvish Cloth was brought into the city. No one knows where it is now. And if the rumours of the Orcs buying it are right, no one knows how it’s going to be transported to them. Well, what if it was put inside something that was very secure, which was going back to them eventually?’
    “You mean inside the dragon?”
    “Why not?”
    “How the hell would you stuff a roll of Red Elvish Cloth inside a dragon?”
    “I don’t know. But that Sorcerer who chased me through the sewers is powerful. He might have done it after he hijacked the shipment.”
    Makri scoffs. “Dumbest idea you’ve ever had, Thraxas.”
    “Oh yeah? Well, I trust my intuition. And my intuition tells me that the Red Elvish Cloth is right this minute inside the new dragon at the King’s zoo. It’s the perfect place—in fact it’s the only place, because dragons are well known for disrupting sorcery. If the Cloth was inside that beast, our Palace Sorcerers wouldn’t be able to detect it, Elvish marks or not. A very clever notion, Makri, very clever indeed. Hide the Cloth in the dragon, wait till it mates with the King’s, then off it