Free Blackstone (Book 2) by Honor Raconteur

disaster?”
    Siobhan let out a breath she hadn’t known she was holding.
“I am so glad to hear you say so. Thank you. Thank all of you so much.”
    “We might yet be able to prevent this war from even
happening,” Oh Jae Pyo suggested, sharing a speaking look with Kim Ra Im. “If
the economy is the problem, then surely the trend can be reversed?”
    “I would think so,” Kim Ra Im agreed. “Perhaps we should sit
down with Siobhan-jia and gather more information.”
    “My trader, Sylvie, is the better person to ask about this,”
Siobhan denied. “She’s the one that has her finger firmly on the pulse. Markl
would also be a good person to confer with, as he’s been making extensive notes
and graphs on the matter.”
    “We will require an introduction…” Oh Jae Pyo trailed off
suggestively.
    “I will be happy to get you acquainted with them, of
course.”
    “Excellent.” Bo Sei Jin clapped his hands, gathering their
attention. “I believe we have reached a unanimous decision. We shall send
experts back with Deepwoods Guild with letters of introduction to their main
guildmaster, and try to nip this problem before it blooms. Tonight, we shall
dine together, and become better acquainted. This is agreeable?”
    Siobhan put her hands to her stomach and bowed to them,
hoping she did the gesture right even as she moved. “Very much so. You have my
gratitude.” When she looked up again, she was faced with nothing but smiling
faces. Oh good, she must have done that correctly.
    “Come,” Sei Ja Na invited, extending her hand toward the
door. “Follow me, and we shall eat together. Man Fei Lei-gui, go and fetch the
rest of your guild and your family. We shall all eat together.”
    Fei bowed in acknowledgement before disappearing silently
out the door.
    Siobhan got to her feet and was barely able to cross to the
door before Kim Ra Im appeared at her elbow. In an undertone he asked, “As we
walk, tell me how you gained my former pupil as a guild member.”
    Another person that wanted stories on Fei? Oh, fun. She hid
her eagerness behind a demure smile as she agreed, “As you wish.”
    ӜӜӜ
    Wolf was a simple man. Anyone that offered to feed him was a
friend, and they stayed a friend until they tried to stick a knife in his back.
It was as simple as that. It didn’t matter if they were from a different
culture, or the food was something he’d never seen before, or if guests sat on
cushions instead of proper chairs. If there was food available, he was fine.
    This gathering proved to be better than a simple ‘fine.’
    The meeting that’d had Siobhan’s hair in knots had turned
out to be short, sweet, and—judging from that satisfied smile on her
face—victorious. He hadn’t heard the details yet, but didn’t need to in order
to know that she had gotten her way. In fact, that expression said she had done
better than hoped for. That was enough for him.
    The building had a large, open floor in the middle of it,
with a part of the room built up a half-step from the rest of it. No one sat up
there, which Wolf took to mean that rank didn’t matter tonight. This relieved
him, because while Fei had drilled manners into Siobhan’s head, he hadn’t exactly
been paying attention. He’d hate to ruin Siobhan’s hard work with a careless
remark.
    As the guild filed in, Siobhan went from person to person,
introducing them to the council. Wolf bowed politely, murmured a few words, and
kept his eyes on the room in general. It was because of this that he caught the
lowering of the table.
    Someone had put together a rig so that the long, rectangular
table could be lowered by pulley to the floor and back up to hang on the
ceiling. As he watched, two men were working the ropes, carefully lowering the
piece of furniture. Why…why in sweet mercy would you hang a table from the
ceiling? Granted, it would be handy during the day, to just put it ‘up’ when
you didn’t need it, but it seemed beyond strange to do