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And then he issued his demand.
"He wanted them to know how big a pistol he was prepared to hold to all of their heads. If he claims the Act is nullified, if he refuses to acknowledge Zindel's rightful coronation, then what happens to all of the preparations we need to make? Do you think for an instant that once that sack of snakes was untied, there wouldn't be enormous pressure from other members of the Conclave to give him more of what he wanted in the first place if that was the only way to get him to sign back up quickly now that the Arcanans have proven they're a genuine, immediate threat?
"He might as well have handed us a written memo about his new strategy, Alazon! The way he saw it, he won either way. Either he got to name Andrin's husband under the terms of the Act, or else Zindel told him to go straight to the Arpathian hells before he gave one of Chava's sons his daughter. And if that happened, if Zindel refused to honor the Act's terms, then Chava could declare that Zindel's decision to invalidate the Act absolved him of his agreement to surrender the sovereignty of Uromathia to Zindel ... and that would have given him all the leverage in the world, unless we chose to fight that very civil war the Emperor told me last night he wanted to avoid!
"It's obvious from the Voice reports and print articles you've had me Watching and reading ever since I got back that Chava never really regarded the original Arcanan massacre as a genuine threat. He was doing his best to game the situation then, and he's doing exactly the same thing now. He's just changing technique, using the threat everyone else sees as genuine to frighten them into conceding the points they refused to give him before. If he can simultaneously frighten the other members of the Conclave badly enough and appear sufficiently intransigent, he'll get at least some of his demands—maybe even most of them. And he won't give a good godsdamn how long he delays unification, how much damage he does to our ability to deal with the Arcanans, as long as there's a chance of improving his position."
"But—"
""thinspace"'But' nothing, love," Kinlafia said softly, sadly. "You know that's what would happen. And so does her father. My gods, Alazon, you know how much he loves her, and you saw as well as I did what he was prepared to do out there today! Yes, it was her decision, and I know as well as you do that she never even warned him she was going to do it. That she deliberately didn't give him time to think about ways to stop her, or for the father in him to find some justification—any justification—for keeping her from doing this. But if he hadn't realized in the end that she was right, he would never have let her get away with it. Never."
"But there has to be another way." Alazon was no longer protesting or denying. She was almost pleading. "We can't just let her do this, Darcel. We can't!"
Tears glittered in the Privy Voice's eyes, and Darcel put his arm around her and hugged her tightly.
"I don't see how we can stop her," he said, and in the back of his brain he saw once again the image of Andrin weeping. "I'm finally begi
"It will kill her," Alazon said softly. "Maybe not physically—not quickly. But it will kill her." She looked up at Kinlafia, and a single tear broke free and trickled down her cheek. "I never really knew her until this entire impossible crisis just exploded in our faces. But now that's changed. And if she marries someone like one of Chava Busar's sons, it will just destroy her inside."
Kinlafia nodded, hearing the pain in her beautiful voice. That pain, he knew, was the reason someone with Alazon's sharp intelligence and grasp of politics could insist that Andrin had to be stopped. And gods knew she was right. If there'd been any way to avoid this ... .
"We're just going to have to hope she's stronger than that," he said. "I've read the entire Act since you gave me a copy. If I could see any way for her to—"
He paused suddenly, and Alazon stiffened in the circle of his arm as she Felt a sudden, incredible cascade of thoughts and emotions tumbling through him. Then he inhaled sharply and looked into her eyes.
"Gods!" he half-whispered. "That's it."
"What?" Alazon demanded.
"I've just had an idea," he told her. "My gods, it's what Janaki Glimpsed!"
"What's what Janaki Glimpsed?!"
"We've got to go find Andrin," Kinlafia told her. "And be sure you bring your copy of the Act!