Free Evil for Evil by K. J. Parker Page A

from? The miners, I mean, the people who dug it out of the ground."
    She looked at him, and she most certainly wasn't drunk or rambling. "I don't think he ever mentioned it," she said. "Just salt-miners, that's all."
    "Are you sure?" Vaatzes raised his eyebrows. "I'd have thought that if you were trading with them, you'd have known a bit about them. So as to know what they'd be likely to want, in exchange for the salt."
    "You'd have thought." She shrugged. "I guess that's how come we lost so much money."
    Vaatzes smiled. "I see," he said. "Well, that explains that. It's a shame, though." He leaned back in his chair and sipped a little of the wine. It was actually quite good. She waited for rather a long time, then scowled.
    "Are you really thinking about going into the salt business?" He nodded. "And of course," he went on, "I wouldn't expect an experienced businesswoman to go around giving valuable trade secrets away for nothing." She nodded, very slightly. He went on, "Unfortunately, until I've got finance of my own, backers, I haven't got anything to offer up front, in exchange for valuable information."
    "Ah."
    "But." He waited for a moment, then continued. "It occurred to me, however, that you might be interested in a partnership. Of sorts," he added quickly, as she looked up at him sharply. "I'm sure you know far more about this sort of thing than I do; but the way I see it is, I can't get any serious funding for the idea unless I've got something hard to convince a potential backer with. Once I've got the money, of course…"
    "I see," she said, with a sour little smile. "I tell you what I know, you take that and get your funding with it, and we settle up afterward, when the business is up and running." She sighed. "No disrespect, but what are you bringing to the deal?" He smiled. "Energy," he said. "Youth. Boundless enthusiasm. And the information isn't doing you any good as it is," he added. "It's just cluttering up your mind, like inherited furniture."
    Her scowl deepened. "There'd have to be a contract," she said.
    "Of course," Vaatzes said, smiling. "All properly written up and sealed and everything."
    "Ten percent."
    "Five."
    She made a vague grunting noise, shook her head. "Fair enough," she said. "It's a waste of your time and effort, mind, there never was a margin in it."
    "Times have changed," Vaatzes said. "The war, for one thing."
    "What's the war got to do with it?"
    He gave her a fancy-you-not-guessing look. "All those soldiers," he said, "on both sides, living off field rations. You know the sort of thing: salt beef, salt pork, bacon…"
    She blinked. "That's true," she said. She hesitated, then added, "The Mezentines always used to buy off the Cure Doce, at Mundus Vergens. Don't suppose the Cure Doce go there much anymore, what with the guerrillas and all." She scratched her nose; the first unselfconscious gesture he'd seen her make. "I wonder how they're getting salt nowadays," she said.
    "From Lonazep," Vaatzes said briskly. "I have done a little bit of research, you see. It's coming in there from somewhere, but nobody's sure where. But it's rock salt; Valens' men have found enough of it in the ration bags of dead Mezentines to know that. So it must ultimately be coming from the desert; and no army can keep going without salt, not if they're far from home, at the long end of their supply line. So if someone could find the producers and buy up the entire supply—well, that'd be a worthwhile contribution to the war effort, in my opinion. What do you think?" She was scowling at him again. "I should've known you'd be political," she said.
    "Me?" He shook his head. "Not in my nature. But I think that if I had solid information to go on, I could get some money out of the Duke. I've got a living to earn, after all. It looks like I'm going to be stuck here for a long time, maybe the rest of my life. It's about time I settled down and got a job."
    She breathed out slowly. "Like I said," she replied, "there'd