easy. A few concealed needle guns, shotted around–and as a backup,
maybe, some thoroughly armed bully boys hidden away in buildings near
the Capitol. If necessary, they seize it, proclaim themselves the
Revolutionary Committee … and, given the spadework the enemy’s done
over the years, they can probably raise enough popular support to commit
your people beyond any chance of turning back.”
“If you have thought of this and not despaired,” Kyrwedhin said, “you
must have a plan.”
Flandry frowned. “I’d rather hear what you have in mind. You know your
establishment.”
“But I am taken by surprise.”
Kossara spoke against storm-noise: “I know. If you and I,
Dominic–especially I–if we appear before them, suddenly, in
person–why, killing us would be worse than useless.”
Kyrwedhin’s tail smacked the floor. “Yes!” he cried. “My thoughts were
headed your same way. Though you can’t simply walk in from Constitution
Square. You’d never pass the Iron Portal alive. What you need is an
escort, bodies both shielding and concealing you, on your way right into
the Union Chamber.”
“How?” snapped from a village chief.
Kossara had the answer: “Ychani have always been the Peculiar People of
Dennitza. The House of the Zmayi has never entirely spoken for them;
it’s a human invention. If, in a desperate hour, several hundred Obala
fishers enter Zorkagrad, march through Square and Portal into the
Chamber, demanding their leaders be heard–it won’t be the first time in
history. The enemy will see no politic way to halt that kind of
demonstration. They may well expect it’ll turn to their advantage;
outsiders would naturally think Merseian-descended Dennitzans are
anti-Terran, right? Then too late–” She flung her hands wide, her voice
aloft. “Too late, they see who came along!”
Beneath the surf of agreement, Flandry murmured to her: “My idea also. I
kept hoping somebody would have a better one.”