The Shining Ones by David Eddings

Author:David Eddings
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: Epic, Fantasy, General, Fiction
ISBN: 9780345388667
Published: 1993-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

"It was dreadful,' Oscagne shuddered. 'We had to disrupt the

entire government in order to conceal the fact that we were

really only interested in the files at Interior. Milord Stragen and

the Baroness put their heads together and concocted a system.

It's totally irrational and wildly inconsistent, but for some reason

it works amazingly well. I can' lay my hands on any given piece

of paper in less than an hour.'

'Anyway,' Stragen continued, 'we browsed around through

the files at Interior for a week or so, but the people over there

kept slipping back into the building at night to move things

around so that we'd have to start all over again every morning.

That's when we decided to just move our operations out onto

the lawns. We stripped all the paper out of all the buildings and

spread it out on the grass. That inconvenienced the rest of the

government enormously, but Interior was still holding out on us.

They were still hiding the critical files. Caalador and I reverted to

type and tried burglary - along with Mirtai. The queen sent her

along to remind us that we were looking for paper rather than

miscellaneous valuables, I guess. It took a few nights, but we

finally found the hidden room where the files we wanted were

concealed. '

'Didn't they miss them the next morning?' Bevier asked him.

'We didn't take them, Sir Knight,' Caalador told him. 'The

queen called in a young Pandion who used a Styric spell to bring

the information back to the castle without physically removing

the documents.' He grinned. 'We got us all that there real incriminatin'

stuff, an' they don't know we got it. We stole it, an' they

don't even miss it.'

'We've got the name of every spy, every informer, every secret

policeman and every conspirator of whatever rank Interior has

in all of Tamuli,' Sarabian smirked. 'We've been waiting for all

of you to come home so that we can take steps. I'm going to

dissolve the Ministry of the Interior, round up all those people,

and declare martial law. Betuana and I have been in close contact,

and we've laid our plans very carefully. As soon as I give

the word, the Atans are going to take charge of the entire

Empire. Then I'll really be the Emperor instead of just a stuffed

toy.'

'You've all been very busy,' Vanion observed.

"It makes the time go faster, my Lord.' Caalador shrugged.

'We went a little farther, though. Krager obviously knew that

we were using the criminals of Matherion as spies, but we

weren't sure if he knew about the hidden government. If he

thinks our organization's localized, that's not much of a problem;

but if he knows that I can give the order here in Matherion, and

somebody dies in Chyrellos, that's a whole 'mother thang.'

'I've missed that dialect,' Talen said. He considered it. 'Not

really very much, though,' he added.

'Critic,' Caalador accused.

'How much were you able to find out?' Ulath asked him.

Caalador spread one hand and rocked it back and forth doubtfully.

"It's sorta hord t' say,' he admitted. 'They's some places

whur it iz oz them folks o' ourn kin move around free oz frogs

in a muddy pond. Other places, they can't.' He made a sour

face.

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