Beyond the Shadows - Brent Weeks [101]
Momma K raised an eyebrow.
“Uh, sorry, I didn’t mean . . .”
Logan came to his rescue, he said, “I asked her before anyone else could. I find there are so few beautiful women in this realm intelligent enough to form complete sentences.”
“Yawp,” Momma K said, in a perfect coastal Ceuran drawl. “Where’s thet spittoon?”
Kylar laughed out loud. The truth was more likely that wearing mourning clothes and showing up with an older woman were the best ways Logan could fend off unwanted advances. If Logan had shown up with a young woman as his escort—or none at all—the matchmakers would have started in on him, mourning clothes or no mourning clothes. Kylar was still chuckling when he saw Terah Graesin, a few places beyond Logan, and his laughter died.
“Kylar?” Momma K asked. “Is something wrong?”
He shook himself. “I keep waiting for her head to explode.” To his right, the nattering grasper gasped. He ignored her. He couldn’t take his eyes off the queen. She drank. She leaned close to Lantano Garuwashi on her right and shared private observations. She jested with a lord at one of the lower tables who’d spilled his wine over his wife. She chatted with her brother who sat at her left. All the while, her death was waiting.
Kylar had expected it to explode soon after the crown was placed on her head, while she was still standing alone before the lords. Now, if he’d put too much philodunamos under her crown, he might kill others, too. Luc Graesin, though a relative innocent, wouldn’t be much of a loss. But Lantano Garuwashi? Killing the legendary Ceuran would be disastrous.
“What I don’t understand,” Logan was saying to Momma K, “is why, out of all people, you are pushing Jarl’s proposals.” The name made Kylar pay attention.
“If I said it was because Jarl gave me hope, would you believe me?” Momma K asked.
A troubled look crossed Logan’s face, and Kylar saw the old naive Logan briefly at battle with the Logan who’d spent months in the Hole. “I’d believe that was part of it,” he said.
She smiled. “The fact is, Jarl’s plans are not just good for the Rabbits—they’re good for everyone. Do you know how much the average Rabbit spends when he visits a whorehouse?” She laughed at the look that crossed Logan’s face. “I was being rhetorical, Your Grace. Three silver pieces. One on drink, two for the girl. I make one silver in profit. The average merchant buys wine, a meal, sometimes tobacco, sometimes riot weed, then a girl. I keep more than a crown in profit. And when nobles visit? Desserts, dancers, bards, jugglers, aperitifs, fine wines, plus other services you’d probably prefer I not mention. I take seven crowns in profit. So, if you were a cutthroat merchant queen, which would you choose?”
Logan’s cheeks were pink, but he nodded. “Point taken.” Kylar could barely believe his eyes. Logan, talking calmly about the economics of prostitution?
“The problem with how the people have looked at the Rabbits is that they see them as grubby, uncultured, and dangerous. I see them as potential customers.”
“But you’re not hurting for money. You own, what? half of the, uh, houses of pleasure in this city?” Logan said. Momma K gave a feline smirk, and at that expression, Kylar realized that she didn’t own half the city’s brothels. She owned them all. “And I’ve heard you don’t pay taxes, ever. Even if we were able to figure out exactly which magistrates in this city take bribes and which don’t—” as Logan said it, Kylar realized Logan was speaking with the one woman in the city who could tell him—“if we removed them, you would suddenly have a raft of expenses you never had before. I can’t imagine you’d come out ahead. If you were the city’s most astute merchant, would you choose taxes or no taxes?”
“In the past twenty years, I’ve had nobles seize entire brothels no less than fifteen times. Banks I had an interest in have