Chapter 35 - A Change of Plans

Myria had an uncomfortable feeling in her stomach. It was similar to the feeling she had experienced the first day of the hearings. Anxiety was the word then. This time a better word was dread.

We need to talk. Please meet me at my offices at your convenience on the morrow before noon.

The message had arrived at the hotel that afternoon. It was signed Bodkins Hardlee, Esq.

"I'll let the commander know about the meeting. I'm sure he'll want an escort for you." Cheery offered.

"Thank you, Cheery." Myria managed a faint smile, but her heart wasn't in it.

"I'm coming with you." Jessica chimed in. She and Jonathon had been taking turns stopping by the hotel each evening. There had been some trouble initially with the staff over that, but Cheery had talked to Commander Vimes, who had talked to Lady Sybil, who'd had a word with Lady Bellhame, who had made a suggestion to her husband, who owned the establishment.

Of such things are problems resolved among the nobbish.

"Are you certain the bakery can function without you, Jessica? I would not want to leave them in a difficult position."

Jessica snorted. "Are you kidding? They'll survive for a day. Jonny is doing well enough, and I've been cooped up there for days. The last time I got to really stretch my legs was our little shopping trip." She frowned. "Wonder how that toad Gristle is doing. Maybe I'll pay him a visit sometime."[1]

"Mister Grisswell?"

"Yeah him." She shook her head. "Anyway, like I said, it'll do me good to get out. Besides, I haven't ever seen a real law office before."

Cheery shot Myria a look and coughed.

"Thank you. But I fear this will not be a pleasant meeting, and Mr. Hardlee's offices may not be what you are expecting."

Myria had difficulty sleeping that night.

The bed seemed suddenly less comfortable than previous evenings.

And there were noises that she had not previously noticed. Creaking boards. Insects rubbing body parts together in high-pitched vibrato. Periodically a cart with an insufficiently lubricated axle or insufficiently secured chain would pass by outside the window. Once she heard the low voices of watchmen changing shifts, and another time the distant call of one proclaiming all was well.

I do not concur. I do not feel well at all. Why can I not sleep?

She remembered a time, it seemed a lifetime ago, when she had tried desperately to stay awake, and sleep had claimed her despite her terror. Now it eluded her. It was like trying to grasp fog.

Finally in the early hours of the morning, she managed to doze, but awoke repeatedly. And when Cheery and Jessica knocked on her door soon after the sun rose, she felt like she had spent the entire night in physical exertion.

Cheery looked at her with some concern, but didn't say anything.

Jessica was more blunt. "Wow, you look you had a fight with Mister Insomnia."

Myria tried to process that, failed completely, and just shook her head foggily.

"I said, you must not have slept much."

"Ah. No, I did not rest fully."

"Yeah, that happens. Don't worry, ok? I'm sure everything will be fine."

"I do not see how this can be, but thank you for your optimism, Jessica. It is comforting."

"Yeah well, I try. Jonny sends his love too."

"Thank you." She felt her mouth gape in a yawn. "I am sorry. If you will excuse me, I will dress and meet you in the lobby."

She felt a little more alert by the time she had dressed and joined the other two in the lobby, though her head was still a bit on the fuzzy side. The carriage ride to Hardlee's offices went by in a blur.

"Myria, we're here."

"What? How?"

"You fell asleep. Wow you really were tired."

"I suppose I was."

As they exited the cab, Jessica peered around, looking for… well something impressive.

"It's over here." Cheery muttered, pointing at the rotting door.

"You're joking. She's joking, right Myria? This is your attorney's office?"

"Yes."

"Myria, if this guy was a teenager, he'd be the pimply kid no one asks to dance, and you'd be the most popular girl in the neighborhood. And you're worried he's going to dump you?"

"I think I understand what you are saying. But surely-"

"Myria, seriously, you've got a lot to learn about people. And money. And people without money. C'mon, let's see what he has to say."

"Wait!" Cheery managed, just before Jessica grabbed the door handle firmly and pulled it completely out of the termite-softened wood.[2]

With a loud sigh and much grumbling, Cheery extracted the doorknob from Jessica's hand, stuck it back into the door a few inches above its previous location, and then picked the entire assembly up and leaned it against the wall.

"After you."

When they reached the end of the hall, Cheery knocked loudly on the wall.

"Do come in! Come in!" Hardlee's face lit up. "Ah, Lady LeJean! And of course, Officer Littlebottom, so pleased to see you again." His smile broadened. "And who is this lovely young lady?"

Jessica smirked a little, but Myria thought she detected a slight blush as well. "Wow, you're more desperate than I thought."

"And a quick wit too! Marvelous! Have you considered a career in the legal field?"

Jessica made a big show of taking in the state of Hardlee's offices, dust and broken furniture and all, with one eyebrow permanently raised.

"Oh it's not all this glamorous, I promise." Hardlee laughed. "And I still didn't catch the name!"

"This is my friend Jessica Knäcke, Mister Hardlee."

"Oh! Yes of course. The young lady from the bakery."

"Yes. I understood that you wished to speak with me?"

"Ah yes. We had an appointment, right? I'd confer with my secretary of course, but as you observed, she's been taking her tea for the last several millennia." He laughed again, and even Jessica found herself smiling as she shook her head.

Hardlee's smile faded. "But as you say, we have business to attend to." He turned to the other two. "Would you mind terribly if I conferred with Lady LeJean in private? I'm sorry I don't have much in the way of seating arrangements, but there is a nice café just around the corner."

Cheery and, more reluctantly, Jessica, turned to leave.

"May they stay?"

"As your attorney, I wouldn't recommend it."

Myria smiled slightly. "Mister Hardlee, I must admit, I am surprised that you still find representing me to be agreeable."

"Frankly, my lady, I need the money," Jessica gave Myria a look and silently wet her finger and painted a phantom "one point for me" in the air in front of her.[3] Hardlee continued on. "And more than that, I want to beat Slant." He stood up and paced behind his desk a few times. "Besides that, this is the first time I've been able to practice my craft out in the open. Do you know what it's like having to hide the fact that you actually have clients? After years of that, give a man the chance to walk around in broad daylight, and it's like wine to a drunk."

Myria felt something, a tension, drain from her. It left her feeling as if her head were suddenly lighter.

"I see. Then what is it that we need discuss, which is not suitable for my friends to hear?"

Hardlee stopped his pacing, and got a queer look on his face. "You know all those things I said before, about not wanting to know things unless I asked about them?"

"I remember, yes."

"Forget that rule. For you, that is a stupid rule. It does not apply to you. I've decided you are the exception that proves the rule." He slapped his hands together and beamed.

"The exception that… this makes no sense." Hardlee's face fell. "An exception does not prove a rule. It merely exists as an exception to the rule. And if there are enough exceptions then the rule itself is, in fact, misrepresenting-"

Jessica put her hand on Myria's arm, and addressed Hardlee. "She can go on like this for hours. You should just get to the point."

At which point Myria closed her mouth, took a breath, and "I am sorry. You were saying, Mister Hardlee?"

"I take it back."

"You take it… I see. Yes. What do you retract?"

"As your attorney, I recommend Jessica stay for this. I may need her to do that again."

Jessica laughed. "You learn fast."

"Don't I just. And to answer your previous question, Myria, I'm going to ask you a question, and I want you to tell me everything."

"Everything?"

"Everything."

Myria looked at Jessica, who chewed her lip. "Um… do you guys have some sort of code? About not telling things about your client?"

"Right, it's called attorney client privilege. We can't divulge anything that's not in the interests of our client or that they demand we keep secret."

Jessica narrowed her eyes and studied Hardlee for a few moments. It was uncanny, that look. She slowly nodded her head. "Go ahead, Myria. If he blabs, we can always shove him in the oven at the bakery."

"But Jessica, I do not believe he would fit. And the fire is not nearly-"

"That was a joke, Myria."

"I was aware of that, Jessica. I was attempting to play along."

"Excuse me."

All three turned to look at the dwarf.

"I think it would be better if I did wait at the cafe."

Jessica and Myria looked at each other. "I trust you, Cheery. You may stay if you wish."

Cheery shuffled from one foot to the other, and played with her beard a bit. "I know, and I appreciate that. But I have to do my job, too. And that means telling Mister Vimes what I know and what I guess. I wouldn't like to have secrets from him. She blew her cheeks out. "So I'm thinking maybe it's better that I don't know some things, just yet. What I don't know, I can't be expected to tell, see."

"I see. Thank you. I believe that Miss Susan was wrong about you." This was a new thought for Myria. She had gotten used to the idea that Susan was, well, much older and wiser than she was about almost everything. Despite the fact that they physically appeared to be of similar age, Susan had this air of hard-won cynicism about her which often passed for wisdom. The idea that Susan might be wrong… well that required some additional thought, but there was not time at the moment. "You may wish to attend to other matters until the noon mealtime."

Hardlee looked suddenly intrigued. "You really think it will take that long?"

Myria took a deep breath, echoed by a snort from Jessica. "You wanted to know everything. I will tell you all that I can. And yes. It will be a long conversation."[4]

Hardlee swam in a sea of information.

Swam? Hell he floundered in a raging tide, pouring between jagged rocks and crashing against hundred-foot cliffs. It was like having your brain scoured out of your skull with half-naked exploding revelations.[5]

"This is a bit more complicated than I imagined."

"Wow, aren't you mister understatement," Jessica supplied.

"I understand, Mister Hardlee."

"No. No you don't." He looked uncomfortable. "You are not necessarily human. No human mother or father. No record of birth."

"This is correct."

"Right. Right…" He recovered. "But the interesting thing, from a legal standpoint, is that you may not have even been entitled to appeal to the tribunal in the first place. There's no precedent for non-humans using that venue to settle disputes. However!" He raised a hand. "Since Lord Rust also agreed to submit to its judgment, it's a rather moot point. He could argue false pretense, but I doubt he'd get far."

"And?"

"And this also bears on the problem we've had from the beginning. Rust can't explain how he put the gold in the stones, and you could explain, but no one would believe it unless you demonstrated how you did it.

Myria closed her eyes. She could feel the pressure, lurking in the back of her head. Just thinking about doing that again made her pulse throb against her skull.

"No way." Jessica interjected. "No. Way. We are not letting them make Myria out to be some kind of freak show. And you know that's what would happen."

"I wouldn't have put it that way, but I understand your depth of feeling. Add to this the fact that if we did demonstrate how she did it," throb throb "it would raise all sorts of legal questions about who and what Lady LeJean actually is. Which would give Slant and Rust additional angles with which to challenge her rights to title and gold both."

"Mister Hardlee, this all seems very hopeless."

"Oh it's not as bad as it seems. Our counter-argument would be that the trolls and dwarves aren't human, and they have nobility as well. So the question would then become inter-species and drop right back into Vetinari's lap as a matter between foreign powers. Which is clearly what he does not want either."

"But I am not-"

"Not a foreign power? Lady LeJean, as far as I can tell, you are your own nation. A country of one. You might even be Queen. And ambassador. And very likely your entire military force as well. There's precedent, you see. Some of the smaller Ramptops kingdoms-"

"But… I cannot simply claim to be a queen."

"Wrong again. How do you think the first nobility came to be? They just claimed the titles and made them stick… usually by sticking or threatening to stick everyone else with sharp pointy objects."

"Wait, Myria a queen? Queen Myria? Oh that's just dragonsfire." Then Jessica realized what that would make her cousin if he and Myria married, and almost fell off her chair. "Whoah…"

"But… we should make this claim?"

"Hell no. That's our option of last resort. As your attorney, I'm required to overlook any… past character flaws," he went on in a very low and fast-paced monologue "such as attempting to destroy all of humanity and periodically turning people into dust." He cleared his throat. "Others might not handle that little tidbit quite so well." He waved his hands in intricate patterns in the air. "No, I have something a bit more subtle in mind."

"Let me get this straight." Jessica said slowly and carefully. "You're going to propose that Myria give half the gold to Rust."

"Absolutely not!"

"Whew. You had me going there for a minute. I thought you'd lost your mind."

"I was thinking more like a 60/40 split, and since Myria doesn't currently have it, she's not actually giving it. She's just not taking it back."

"Why should Myria give Rust even forty percent?"

"Not quite what I meant. We'd give him sixty percent and Myria would keep forty percent. Less my fees of course."

Jessica stood up suddenly, requiring Myria to stop the chair from falling over behind her. "That is insane. Why would you do that?"

"Because, my young friend, to get Rust to take any sort of deal, we have to make him feel he is actually winning. The only way to do that would be to offer him a slightly larger share. These old money nobility are all about ego and saving face."

"But Mister Hardlee, does this not mean that Mister Slant would win, in a manner of speaking?"

Hardlee sighed. "I know. It hurts, it really does. I suppose I'll just have to settle for a draw. And if I try very hard, I can imagine… Slant staring at a piece of paper with my signature on it, knowing that he has to sign it in order to reach the settlement… with me. A settlement, mind you. A draw almost. Maybe, if I try really hard, I can imagine his head exploding right after he signs it." He looked suddenly very wistful. "A man can dream." He shook his head and smiled. "But really, Rust isn't going to end up with a larger share. Considering the rates that Slant is charging him, he'll probably come out with less than you anyway."

"I see." Myria considered for a long minute. "Yes, I find this acceptable. And I am sorry that I could not be the case that allowed you your revenge."

"But Myria, that's your money, not Rust's. It's just not fair."

"But what does it mean? To have all of that wealth, Jessica? What can I purchase with it? I have no need for a quarter that amount, much less for all of it. And I find that it merely causes me and my friends harm, does it not?"

Hardlee coughed, drawing their attention. "Well in that case, perhaps we could discuss a modest increase in my rates?"

"Don't even think about it."

[1] With a paper bag full of manure and a few matches, most likely. Kids these days.

[2] Which was, in fact, fortunate. The alternative was having the entire door come down on top of her. Though, considering the door's current density, that would have been the equivalent of being tackled by a Styrofoam golem.

[3] Which Myria totally missed the significance of.* But Jessica will be sure to explain it later, you can bet on it.
* Oh dear, I seem to have dangled my preposition. See it there all dangly? Oh dear oh my.

[4] Which, amazingly, did not involve pushing her sister down the stairs and blaming it on the dog, or making an entire theater full of people physically sick to their stomachs.

[5] Which are marginally more shocking than half-naked exploding porpoises.