Free The Black Star (Book 3) by Edward W. Robertson

open the door, nearly braining the startled porter, and clomped inside.
    Before he'd made it past the tiled foyer, Taya materialized with her typical abruptness. The sword on her hip had been loosened from its scabbard. She eyed Blays and made an instant assessment.
    "He turned you down," she said.
    "How could you tell?" Blays peeled off his outer jacket and flung it over a couch. Outside, the air was thin and chilly, but the manor's many glass windows let it catch sun all day. "What if I were in mourning for the cat we ran over on the way in? Then you'd look pretty silly, leaping to conclusions."
    Taya shook her head. "You'd be upset, but you wouldn't be angry. This is about the duke."
    "Of course it's about the duke. When isn't it?"
    "You can be angry about him. Or you can explain what happened and we can fix it."
    Blays pinned her with a look of dirk-like sharpness. On most occasions, he enjoyed having Taya around. She was like a thin strip of steel: unobtrusive, but useful in a hundred different ways. Particularly in espionage and certain kinds of hidden wars fought far from fields of battle.
    In other ways, though, she was a right horror. She was all business. Not that she was humorless. Quite the opposite: her mockery was nearly as voluminous and every bit as edged as her knife collection. The problem was she had no time for any words unrelated to the task at hand. She had no appreciation for bitching . For the fact that sometimes you had to blow away the smoke before you could get close enough to the forge to work out new answers.
    "It came down to money," Blays said, getting to it. "Specifically, that he doesn't have any."
    "That wasn't a polite way to avoid saying he wasn't interested?"
    "You've heard the way he talks about bossen. Even if he didn't treasure it like his own blood, the business opportunity alone would make it worthwhile. Anyway, why would he invite me to his home if he had no interest in a deal?"
    "To get a closer look at you." She gazed at him as if to reinforce the possibility. "So do you think he's telling the truth about his finances?"
    Blays flapped his hands. "Do you ?"
    "With a person like Dilliger, it's impossible to take the full measure of his debts, credits, holdings, investments, and estates. But the point is to bankrupt him. We wouldn't be attempting to do that if he weren't already close to the edge."
    "Well, dung. A great big pile of it. How are we supposed to take away his money when he hasn't got any of it?"
    She rubbed her chin. For most people this would be a gesture of thoughtfulness, but he'd seen Taya do the same when she was expecting a fight. He just now understood why: she was putting her hands in position to defend herself without making it obvious that she had her guard up.
    "It's not about money, it's about credit," she said. "So the question is how badly he's willing to spend what he doesn't have."
    He clucked his tongue. "We make him think he's in danger of losing it to somebody else. Are we close to any other deals?"
    "Why would we be? Dilliger was always the target."
    "We could try spreading a rumor. People love rumors."
    Taya shook her head, barely stirring her chin-length brown hair. "He's too well-connected. To take our deal, he'll have to liquidate assets. Secure loans. Do you really think he'll do all that without bothering to confirm with a friend in the palace that you're close to selling?"
    "Maybe if we got him really drunk first."
    "That would be perfectly suited to your skills."
    Blays rolled his eyes. "So we float a big rumor and tug it out to sea with a little fact. We've got a bit of bossen here, right? We sell it, let it hit the streets, and make it known we're close to dealing the rest."
    Taya dropped her hand from her chin. "As your ideas go, that's not a bad one. As long as we're hunting for buyers, we should explore alternative deals. The duke is only the biggest target. If we can't take a clear shot at him, there are others worthy of our arrows."
    "No