Neither the Mountain clan nor the Matyos gang had made a noise of protest or come to Iyilo’s aid. With the dissolution of the nekolva program and the decline in Slow War tensions, along with the decriminalization of jade in the ROE, jade smuggling was not a growing business. Ti Pasuiga was past its usefulness, no longer of vital importance to its old allies.
“Did Kaul Hilo send you to gloat?” Iyilo asked Anden. “Seems like something he would want to do in person, the arrogant bastard. I met him once, you know.”
“The Pillar sent me, yes,” Anden said. “To offer you our help.”
“Your help,” Iyilo repeated with manifest contempt. “Kaul Hiloshudon tortured my cousin Soradiyo and slit his throat. I’d sooner shake hands with the devil.”
Anden took off his glasses and wiped the dust from them, reminding himself that he was here for a purpose and ought not to be provoked by this man who was so low and helpless but still potentially useful. “Soradiyo tried to assassinate the Pillar with a car bomb but killed his brother-in-law instead. Even Ayt Mada wasn’t going to protect him after that. Just as she’s not protecting you now. You’re hardly in a position to be choosy about the help that comes your way.”
The smuggler’s upper lip curled. “Yes,” he said bitterly, “all of you Green Bones are the same in the end, aren’t you? You protect yourselves, and you use the rest of us.”
“Has your lawyer explained that you’ll be sent to Kekon?”
Iyilo shrugged fatalistically. “Kekon is only a name to me. I was a baby when my family was shipped to Shotar as laborers during the Many Nations War. Kekon is only the wrapping around my life—where I was born and where I’ll die.”
Anden felt a scrap of pity for the man. Iyilo had become the center of a three-way legal tug-of-war between the Uwiwa Islands, Kekon, and Shotar. Both Kekon and Shotar wanted the barukan leader extradited to face trial for crimes committed in their own nations. Iyilo was not a citizen of the Uwiwa Islands, despite having run a massive criminal enterprise there for decades. He was not a citizen of Shotar either, as he could not claim at least seventy-five percent Shotarian ancestry. His official nationality was Kekonese, even though he’d only lived there for a year of his life. Now, however, the Kekonese government wanted to make a public example of Iyilo, to march him off the plane in handcuffs, demonstrating the disgraceful end of Ti Pasuiga and all those who dared to steal jade. The Royal Council had made the extradition of Iyilo a prerequisite for the lifting of the embargo and normalization of relations between Kekon and the UI, and after much hassling, the Uwiwan government had agreed.
Anden said, “You’ll likely be dead within hours of setting foot in the country.”
Iyilo did not answer, but his dulled expression showed that he understood reality perfectly well. The former leader of Ti Pasuiga was a loose end for Ayt Mada. There’s no sort of person the Kekonese hold in lower regard than a jade thief. Any number of fellow inmates or prison guards would be more than happy to do the Mountain a favor and ensure Iyilo never spoke in front of a judge.
“What do you want?” Iyilo’s anger sounded weary.
Anden glanced at the guards by the door. They were out of earshot and almost certainly could not understand Kekonese, but nevertheless Anden lowered his voice. “You still have a card to play. You know too much damaging information about the Mountain: the deals Ayt struck with Zapunyo, her alliance with you and the Matyos, her profit from the black market. It’s why she’s sure to have you killed.”
Anden took a cell phone out of his briefcase and placed it on the table. “There’s a private aircraft waiting in Janloon, ready to bring KNB news anchor Toh Kita over here to Tialuhiya. All I have to do is make a phone call to get you a national interview.”
Iyilo’s smile was slow and very cold. “Do you know what I hate more than anything else in the world? Rats. When Zapunyo and I found rats in Ti Pasuiga, we made sure they begged for death. I’ll take my secrets to the grave.”
“You’re in a prison while Ayt Mada sits in her mansion in Janloon.”
“As does your cousin Kaul Hilo. What do I have to gain from being a pawn of No Peak instead of the Mountain? I’m not stupid enough to think it’ll save me.”
Anden was not a Fist accustomed to inspiring fear, but he knew his family’s fate might hinge on his ability to do so at this moment. At other times in the past, he’d been the one to speak or act for the clan when no one else could. In his youth, Anden had felt acutely his difference, his separateness from the rest of the Kaul family. Only over many years had he come to understand this as an advantage. Since he held no official role in the strict hierarchy of the clan, he’d been many things—a healer, a killer, an emissary, an advisor. Today, he was a hammer.