to read him.'
'He was a mere norm, of little importance. Less now, if he is dead. However, if you would apply yourself to the problem at hand, we might be quicker to achieve the results you so passionately desire. Have you studied my notes?'
'You should apply yourself o working, rather than to misguided attempts at correcting my education. Of course I have studied your notes. Didn't you receive my comments?' 'No.'
'I sent a messenger.' 'I did not wish to be disturbed.' 'And / gave him orders to deliver my package to you. He will be punished.' 'Unnecessary.'
'That is not for you to decide. He failed to obey my orders and deserves punishment.'
Urdli smiled coldly. 'You misunderstand. I do not disagree that such failure warrants punishment, young prince. I merely say that your servant need not receive it from your hands.'
'You took it upon yourself to-' 'A matter of prepared defenses,' Urdli said, cutting off Glasgian's rage. 'By the time I realized that he was yours, it was too late. Do you desire compensation?'
He did. Oh yes, he did, but he would not be satisfied with what the old law specified. 'I will waive compensation.' Until I can collect it myself, he added silently.
Urdli seemed satisfied 'I have confirmed our earlier conclusions with regard to location. The crystal was indeed placed at the key junction of the triangle of the mana lines. More importantly, the stone is active.
Given time, we will be able to pinpoint the treasure it guards.'
Glasgian was pleased. 'If we had the location now, we could strike tonight.'
'In undue haste.' Urdli's expression was bland, but Glasgian could sense the sneer.
'Timely action,' Glasgian said defensively
'You have a faulty sense of timing.'
'I only desire what you yourself desire. Is it wrong to wish to see the thing done?'
'No. It is quite understandable, but yours is a child's reaction,' Urdli said.
'I am not a child!'
'Consider to whom you speak, makkaherinit-ha.''
Glasgian heard the warning in Urdli's tone and decided that he would be wise to heed it. This was not the time for a split, which, he suddenly realized, might be exactly what the Australian was trying to provoke. Urdli had needed Glasgian's resources to take the first steps, and even now profited from Glasgian's facilities to perform his researches into the crystal's secrets. Perhaps Urdli had already achieved even greater success than he was admitting and was considering sundering their partnership to claim the stone for himself. Until the secrets were pried from the stone and shared, Glasgian was at a disadvantage; Urdli's magical experience was vital to unraveling the mysteries of the crystal. If a rift occurred now and Urdli retained control of the stone, Glasgian would be cut oif forever from all that could be gained by using the crystal. That was something not to be contemplated. If their partnership must break up, it would happen only when it was to Glasgian's advantage; perhaps later, after they had shared the crystal's secrets.
'Ozidanit makkalos, telegitish t'imiri ti'teheron,' he said, adding a bow to his apology and request for forbearance in the old formal way. 'Forgive me, el der. I am overcome by the necessity of what we are about. I only wish success for our gambit.'
'Then perhaps you will be willing to work for it.'
'Yes, I will work for it.'
'Then sit here in front of me.' The spot Urdli indicated was spattered with the lizard's blood. Glasgian lowered himself and sat cross-legged. His suit would be ruined, but that was a small matter. Like many things, it could be replaced.
Urdli led him into trance and he followed. For hours they worked at the stone's mysteries, picking at the knots of power and slowly unraveling them. And through it all. Glasgian studied Urdli, learning.
Kham wandered the corridors of the subterranean district known as the Ork Underground. His tired eyes roved over the battered storefronts that had opened on the surface level in the nineteenth century, but which had been overtaken when Seattle rebuilt itself on top of them. During the previous century, the tunnels had been a tourist attraction for a time, and unfounded rumors of the extent of the underground had prompted Seattle's outcasts to seek refuge there in the bad times. Those frightened people had at first come only to hide, but many had stayed to live, digging more tunnels and making homes under the city, away from the light and the troubles. The enlarged Underground district was once again a tourist attraction-as long as the tourist was brave enough to enter a world populated almost exclusively by orks and trolls.
Turning down a broad tunnel, Kham left the old Underground and walked through the Mall, the broadest of the ways in the new Underground. The Mall was noisy all around him as orks hawked their crafts and wares. Because it was still daylight topside, some tourists still wandered in these corridors. Come see the odd orks and their subterranean city! Quaintness beyond belief!
He turned down a side way and the crowds grew less. Not many tourists along this route. Down here, away from the Mall, one rarely saw norms. The locals were a mix of metatypes, mostly orks and trolls, but also other metahumans who were too ugly to suit a norm's standards. Down here, the fittings were rustier, the dwellings more haphazard, but Kham felt more comfortable in these parts. He saw none of the garish murals or contorted statuary created for the gawking tourists. The shops catered to basic needs; they didn't bother with the trashy carvings, cheap trinkets, and brightly colored souvenirs that were the stock of the Mall's stores. It was just a neighborhood down here- always nightwise, dank, and smelly, but just a neighborhood. An ork neighborhood.
That was a small comfort. Rabo and The Weeze might be right that the Underground was a good place to hide, but Kham didn't like the idea. It was too full of old memories. The safety it offered outweighed that, however, and so he had agreed with the logic of bringing his family and the other survivors here, where there were more orks than anywhere else in the plex. Among thousands of orks they would be harder to find. Still, Kham wished that they didn't have to hide here. Some place-any place-else would have been better. So why couldn't he think of a safer place?
Until he did, this was where they would stay until the heat was off, until enough time had passed for whatever the elves were doing to be done. Normally, time was a disadvantage to a shadowrunner, always running out when you needed more. Now time was on Kham's side. As it passed, so too would pass the importance of silencing him and the others. Given enough time, the elves wouldn't care about them anymore.
Underground or not, none of it would have meant a thing had Neko not arranged it all with Cog. Kham didn't know how the fixer had managed to pull it off, and Kham didn't really want to know. Cog had succeeded in faking their deaths, but the fix had some unwanted side effects. The vids had picked up the story of the fire in the Barrens. Normally the media didn't give a frag about orks. After all, what was a bit of violence in the Barrens but filler news on a slow night? Somehow, though, the reporter snoops had learned that the bones of a young norm- one who didn't seem to belong to.either faction involved in the violence-had been found in the rubble. Their stories were full of unpleasant speculation about strange ork practices, and it wasn't long before Humanis policlubbers- probably real ones this time-were voicing charges of torture and cannibalism against the orks.
In the Underground that kind of news was received with the derision it deserved. Sure, orks had an attitude toward norms: everybody who had to take the drek norms dished out to orks had an attitude about them. Sure, orks sometimes had some fun with a norm too stupid to stay where he belonged: those norms got what they deserved for trespassing. That was the kind of stuff that happened, the way life worked. Certainly, it was the way life worked down here. Down here, norm metatypes weren't wanted, and intrusions were often met with violence. But it was normal, honest violence. Nobody ever ate anyone. That was for beasts, and orks were people, even if Humanis policlubbers and their ilk didn't believe it. Stupid norms.
Kham hoped that the elves-all of them and not just the badboy elf-were going to be stupid too, hoped they'd buy Cog's make-believe, but he doubted it. That's why Kham had brought the crew down here. If they weren't safe here, they wouldn't be safe anywhere. He had to believe everything was going to work out all right.
Still, for all its wisdom, hiding didn't feel right. Maybe it was just some kind of left-over gang reflex. Maybe it wasn't. Shadowrunners knew the risks, and they took them anyway, but families were supposed to be left out of it. This badguy elf had taken the shadow business and brought it into Kham's personal life. That wasn't the way things were done. Kham wanted to bust the elf's head and let some light into that dark, twisted mind, but taking
