Bite Back 05 - Angel Stakes by Mark Henwick

talk.” He waved us to seats around a table. “And lots more to come. Talk is good. It’s very difficult to fight and talk at the same time.”
    “Keep telling yourself that,” I said, and got a tired smile in return.
    “Skylur will be here shortly,” he said. “With Huang.”
    I swallowed.
    Skylur was bringing Huang here?
    Yelena reached over the table and grabbed his wrist, making him look directly at her. “Tell me Skylur is not considering allowing him to make an assessment of Amber.”
    “Of course not.” He retrieved his arm. “Huang is insisting that any conversation about the dragon is conducted with the smallest possible group and has to include Amber. We have no basis to refuse that. When he gets here, we say we don’t know where the dragon is. He’s capable enough as a sensor to know we’ll be telling the truth. I have to leave the running of that to Skylur. What I need to talk to you about is the threat from Ibarre, which has not gone away.”
    Yelena looked skeptical.
    Tarez said, “He was gaining support right up until Correia jumped in and seconded his demands. You saw his reaction when she did? He knows it’s damaged his position, and as soon as he can separate himself from her without damaging his case, he will.”
    “So that wasn’t something they planned together?” I asked.
    “Not unless he was stupid, and I urge you not to think of him that way. Look, in their own ways, certainly in their own minds, Ibarre and Prowser are loyal Panethus supporters, with conflicting opinions on Skylur’s policies. Ibarre wants to change those policies, and remain in Maine, by taking over the leadership of Panethus, or getting someone more to his liking in that position.”
    “Yeah, I got all that. He’s trying to do it by discrediting Skylur and offering a compromise on Emergence to the conservative and progressive sides of the party.”
    I frowned as I said it, realizing how wrong it was.
    A compromise on Emergence ? That was like being a little bit dead .
    Tarez agreed. “Yes, and Prowser just wants to retain Agiagraphos law and thinks that winning a decisive argument will achieve that. Neither of them want the Hidden Path party to take over.”
    “So Correia ruined both their plans?” Yelena asked.
    “Correia ruined Ibarre’s tactic,” he said. “By coming in like that, she almost healed Panethus’ divisions.” He laughed and held up a warning finger. “Fickle changes. Not something to rely on, and in the way of these things, never enough.”
    “But that’s not all,” I prompted him.
    “No. It’s not.” He leaned his elbows on the table. “Skylur cannot back down on the Eastern Seaboard and so Ibarre will return to the argument. He will try and call attention to anything that gains him support. Altau are already at the very edge of what would be acceptable to the Panethus party, with the whole idea of Emergence and overriding the primary law of the Agiagraphos. Add to that you two.” He gestured at both of us in turn. “Hybrid. Carpathian. Which we’ll deal with. What we can’t afford to deal with is any further indications of epitrepai, of ‘unorthodoxy’.”
    He used the Athanate word, epitrepai, so we understood. It was a word that came up in the Agiagraphos a lot. As an Athanate, you did not want to be considered epitre . Rogues were epitre .
    “Your kin, Amber,” he said. “ Honorary is not epitre.”
    I’d expected this to come up again at some time. I knew there was no such category as ‘honorary’ kin. Kin provided Blood, and they were bound to the House. The ‘honorary’ tag had been a work-around when Colonel Laine and Vera had come to Denver. He hadn’t been ready to be sucked into the Athanate world.
    “Vera is kin already,” Yelena said. “The Colonel? I think we will persuade him.”
    “You mean Vera’s your kin?” Tarez said, surprised.
    I smiled. I’d suspected it was heading that way.
    Yelena nodded. “I’m sorry we’ve not discussed it