Disappearing Act by Margaret Ball

Author:Margaret Ball
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: Science Fiction
ISBN: 0743488539
Publisher: Baen Publishing Enterprises
Published: 2004-10-01T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

Dharampal on Kalapriya

Indukanta Jagat was in a foul temper by the time he was admitted to the audience chambers in Dharampal, but he knew better than to show his anger at being kept waiting too openly. Instead he bowed deeply and praised the Vakil's even-handedness and independence and expressed his certainty that the Barents Resident in Dharampal would have been admitted no sooner than the representative of Udara.

"I fear you have been misinformed," said Yadleen. "Unlike Udara, the independent state of Dharampal has accepted no resident representative of the Barents Trading Society. So the issue of equal treatment does not really arise—does it? You are here. The outlanders are not."

And anybody who took that as an expression that Yadleen favored Udara over the foreign trading company was . . . doing exactly what the Vakil wanted, no doubt.

The Vakil of Dharampal was a slender young man, not yet thirty, whose slight build and clean-shaven face deceived many into thinking him a mere boy who would do whatever his senior counsellors advised. Jagat was not such a fool; this "boy" had maintained Dharampal's perilous neutrality between the growing powers of the Barents Trading Society and the Bashirate of Udara for the five long and difficult years since his accession to the throne, with half his council leaning toward Barents and the other half toward Udara. It had not been an easy balance to maintain; and though Jagat intended to make it considerably more difficult, if not impossible, for Dharampal to remain neutral, he had a grudging respect for the Vakil for having pulled it off this long.

"If they are not here yet, they will be soon," Jagat countered.

Yadleen's calm expression did not change. "Forgive me," he asked in dulcet tones, "but has the honored envoy from Udara been favored with news that has escaped the Vakil of Dharampal? I was not aware that I had accepted a Barents Trading Society Resident. Or does the Society now send its armies against a peaceful state that has given them no cause for offense?"

Indukanta Jagat folded his hands before him and bowed his head like a mourner at a state funeral. Privately he thought the pose deliciously apt: this meeting was indeed the first stage of the funeral of a state. Dharampal could no longer maintain its neutrality, not with Udara at its northern border. "The ways of the Trading Society are well known, Vakil. First they establish the excuse, then come the armies. Traveling toward Dharampal now are two agents of the Society. They will find some excuse to claim insult in your treatment of them; the armies will follow."

"Foreknowledge of the future is no doubt an excellent gift," said the Vakil tranquilly, "but one which the gods have not seen fit to grant me. Our relations with the Barents Trading Society are peaceful, and Gabrel Eskelinen has proven himself sympathetic to our position. He shall be received as an honored guest; what happens thereafter is in the lap of the gods. And I think our country might be rather difficult for the outlander armies.

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