By Heresies Distressed by David Weber Read Free Book Online

Siddarmark which didn’t have a Qwentyn involved in it somewhere, and Tymahn was the acknowledged patriarch of the world-spanning family business. He was one of the Lord Protector’s intimates and a financial adviser to dukes, princes, kings, and vicars. He knew everyone, everywhere, and he had built a lifetime reputation as a man whose word could be trusted and whose enmity was to be feared.
    When Tymahn Qwentyn issued a dinner invitation, it
was
accepted. Even if some of the individuals on the guest list were more than a little anxious about just what he might have in mind. This evening’s invitees strongly suspected the reason they’d been called together, and there was a general air of nervousness as they waited to find out if their suspicions were accurate.
    â€œThank you all for coming,” Qwentyn said, exactly as if there’d been any probability that they might not have. “I’m sure that in these times of uncertainty, all of us can appreciate the necessity for men of goodwill to extend the hand of friendship to one another,” he continued. “Especially when the well-being of so many other people depends upon the decisions those men of goodwill make.”
    The tension ratcheted slightly higher, and he smiled as if he both sensed their increased anxiety and was amused by it.
    â€œI’m quite confident that all of us know one another,” he said, seating himself at the head of the table. “That being the case, I see no particular need for introductions.”
    One or two heads nodded in agreement. Most of them did, in fact, know one another, but there were definitely times when official anonymity was greatly to be desired.
    â€œI’ll come directly to the point, gentlemen,” Qwentyn continued. “I invited you here not simply in my private capacity as a senior stockholder in the House of Qwentyn, but also as a concerned citizen of the Republic. I have concerns of my own, obviously, but I have also been the recipient of certain statements of anxiety from other citizens, both within and without the government. Obviously, those anxieties have been expressed as one private individual speaking to another private individual, so please do not make the mistake of assuming that this meeting bears any particular official . . . stamp of approval, as it were.”
    No one bothered to nod this time. Despite any qualifications he might voice for the record, Tymahn Qwentyn did not mention contacts with anyone “within and without the government” unless he was, in fact, speaking for that government. Or, at least, for those with very powerful interests within it. And given his close personal relationship with the Lord Protector, the chance that he would even consider acting against Greyghor Stohnar’s expressed desires was effectively nonexistent.
    The only question in the minds of his guests was not whether or not he was being used as a sub rosa conduit by the Lord Protector, but rather exactly what it was that Stohnar wanted to tell them.
    â€œRecent events both here in the Republic and elsewhere,” Qwentyn continued after a moment, “have resulted in extraordinary dislocations of business and finance. I’m certain all of you have experienced some of the dislocations to which I refer. And, as myself, I feel certain, you’re deeply distressed by the open schism between the Kingdom of Charis—excuse me, the
Empire
of Charis—and the Knights of the Temple Lands. In a time rife with so much uncertainty, it becomes inevitable that markets will be depressed, that trade will be dislocated and businesses will falter, and that some of those businesses will fail, with disastrous consequences not simply for their owners and shareholders, but also for those who depend upon them as a means to earn their own livelihood.
    â€œWhile I feel confident none of us would dispute the Knights of the Temple Lands’ right to formulate their own foreign