Teckla by Steven Brust Read Free Book Online Page B

were."
    She said, "I was conducting a class."
    "A class? On what?"
    "Reading. For a group of Easterners and Teckla." I stared at her. "My wife, the teacher."
    "Don't."
    "Sorry."
    Then I said, "How long have you been doing this?"
    "I just started."
    "Oh. Well." I cleared my throat. "How did it go?"
    "Fine."
    "Oh." Then another, nastier thought occurred to me. "Why is it only now that you've started doing this?"
    "Someone had to take over for Franz," she said, confirming exactly what I was afraid of.
    "I see. Has it occurred to you that this may be what he'd been doing that someone didn't like? That this was why he was killed?" She looked straight at me. "Yes."
    A chill spread along my backbone. "So you're asking—"
    "I'm not Franz."
    "Anyone can be killed, Cawti. As long as someone is willing to pay a professional—and it's clear that someone is—anyone can be killed. You know that."
    "Yes," she said.
    "No," I said.
    "No what?"
    "Don't. Don't make me choose—"
    "I am choosing."
    "I can't let you walk into a situation where you're a helpless target."
    "You can't stop me."
    "I can. I don't know how yet, but I can."
    "If you do, I'll leave you."
    "You won't have that choice if you're dead." She paused to wipe up the klava that had spilled from my cup. "We are not helpless, you know. We have support."
    "Of Easterners. Of Teckla."
    "It is the Teckla who feed everyone else."
    "I know. And I know what happens to them when they try to do anything about it. There have been revolts, you know. There has never been a successful one except during the reign of the Orca, right before the Teckla. As I said, we aren't there now."
    "We're not discussing a Teckla revolt. We're not talking about a Teckla reign; we're talking about breaking the Cycle itself."
    "Adron tried that once; remember? He destroyed a city and caused an interregnum that lasted more than two hundred years, and it still didn't work."
    "We aren't doing it with pre-Empire sorcery, or magic of any kind. We're doing it with the strength of the masses—the ones who have the real power."
    I withheld my opinion of what real power is and who has it. I said, "I can't allow you to be killed, Cawti. I just can't."
    "The best way to protect me would be to join us. We could use—"
    "Words," I said. "Nothing but words."
    "Yes," said Cawti. "Words from the minds and hearts of thinking human beings. There is no more powerful force in the world, nor a better weapon, once they are applied."
    "Pretty," I said. "But I can't accept it."
    "You'll have to. Or, at least, you'll have to confront it." I didn't answer. I was thinking. We didn't say any more, but before we left the klava hole I knew what I was going to have to do. Cawti wasn't going to like it.
    But then, neither was I.
    pr gray trousers:
    remove bloodstain from upper right leg.
    Just in case I haven't made it clear yet, the walk over to the Easterners' section takes a good two hours. I was getting sick of it. Or maybe not. Now that I think back on it, I could have teleported in three seconds, then spent fifteen or twenty minutes throwing up or wishing I could. So I guess maybe I wanted the time to walk and think. But I remember thinking that I was spending altogether too much time just walking back and forth between the Malak Circle district and South Adrilankha.
    But I made it there. I entered the building and stood outside the doorway, which now had a curtain. I remembered not to clap, and I didn't feel like pounding on the wall, so I called out, "Is anyone in there?" There was a sound of footsteps, the curtain moved and I was looking at my friend Gregory. Sheryl was behind him, watching me. I couldn't tell if anyone else was in the room. Since it was Gregory who was standing there, I brushed past him and said, "Is Kelly around?"
    "Come right in," said Sheryl. I felt a little embarrassed. No one else was in the room. In one corner was a tall stack of tabloids, the same one Cawti had been reading.
    Gregory said, "Why do you want