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be those of our race whose thirst for blood and cruelty will not be satisfied
with bloodless combat and who will con-tinue to waste the lives of gladiators.
Not even Lyon could get alaw through the Council forbidding them to kill their
ownslaves. That strikes at the heart and soul of what nearly everyElvenlord
sees as his basic rights over creatures he considers to be no better than
beasts and property." At Kyrtian's nod ofagreement, she smiled. "Nonetheless,
Tenebrinth is right. Most of the Elvenlords will be only too pleased with the
notion thatthey can settle differences through bloodless combat. It's agreat
drain, breeding and buying expensive fighting stock. Thefurther expense of
training gladiators and keeping them intraining is bad enough; it's worse to
have their expensive prop- erty massacredduring training, and nearly as bad
when themassacre happens in settling a petty argument, leaving them to train
gladiators all over again if they wish to maintain their po-sition and
status."
Tenebrinth nodded. "That's been a complaint of the Lesser Lords
against the Greater for the past two generations veryfew have the resources to
toss away slaves without consideringthe expense! Lord Lyon will gain a great
deal of support amongthe Lesser Lords for this, if he makes it policy and
almost asimportantly, hewon't aggravate the Greater. He stands to winall
around."
Lydiell patted her son's hand. "I'm so pleased that I won'teven ask
what trouble you tumbled into in order to achieve this remarkable goal!"
"Mother!" Kyrtian objected, hoping he didn't sound guilty.
"But the price of this is that we are to expect Lord Kyndreth some
time in the immediate future?" the Seneschal interjected. "Did you actually
set a date for the visit?"
"No date has been set, and I told him that I would send him a
Portal-key when I had things ready for him. I tried to give the impression
that, as we were a small household, reclusive andunused to visitors, we needed
time to prepare for the visit of so prominent a guest. He was satisfied with
that so far as I couldtell, and I have no intention of letting him set foot
here until
everyoneis prepared. That won't be until you two and Gel havegotten
the servants and field-hands ready to hold up the illusion that this is an
ordinary estate," Kyrtian assured him. "He didn'tseem all that impatient and
he wasn't offended that I couldn'toffer him our hospitality immediately."
"No doubt he has business of his own to take care of before he can
afford a formal visit," the Seneschal murmured, as if tohimself.
"More likely he is taking the time to see who is and is not ourally,
going back to the time we all left Evelon," Lydiell replied tartly. "Someone
of his rank and status can't afford an ally with an inconvenient number of
deadly enemies."
"Well, the only enemy we have that I know of is Ael-markin...."
Kyrtian said, letting his voice trail off and lookingat his mother
questioningly.
"Correct; Aelmarkin is our only open enemy, with the re-mote
possibility thathis allies might choose to throw in on his side," his mother
confirmed. "Though once they see that Lyonhas thrown in with us, however
briefly, they are unlikely to back Aelmarkin against us in anything important.
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Thank the Ancestors we never meddled in politics on either side of the family!
We'll have a clean slate, so far as Lord Lyon is con-cerned. All we have to
worry about is keeping up appearances for a few days at most."
"I don't intend to ask anything of Lord Lyon for this,Mother," Kyrtian
said, hesitantly. "And I don't intend to make it seem as if I consider it a
great favor on my part to teach him mymethods. I want it to seem as if I
consider this to be how shall 1 put this? something that I truly believeshould
be offered,part of my duty to the Elvenlords as a whole. I want to give him
the impression of a solemn young man who is devoted to the welfare of his
people. Which Iam; just not the people that he thinks." He smiled. "There's no
point in disillusioning him onthat."
"Exactly right; any of the ordinary status-grubbers would dothe
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