The Pirates of Pacta Servanda (Pillars of Reality Book 4) by Jack Campbell Page A

need for a ladder high enough to reach the lights.
    It took a few minutes before Colonel Faron himself returned with a ladder and set it up where Mari directed. She climbed up, thinking that the ladder felt way too rickety, then when high enough began looking over the light fixture.
    And found nothing but the bulbs and the wiring to them.
    Fearing that she might look like an idiot, Mari climbed down and the ladder was moved beneath the second light.
    This time she found what she had been looking for.
    It wasn’t until they were out of the room and the door closed that Mari spoke. “The Mechanics Guild has a far-listener in that second light fixture.”
    “A what?” General Shi asked.
    “A far-listener. It’s a device that picks up sounds and transmits them along wires to somewhere else where they can be heard.” She pointed upward. “The wires for it are disguised by the wires for the light fixture. The Mechanics Guild has been listening in to everything said in that room.”
    “Did you— Did you break it?” the middle-aged man asked.
    “No. Do you want me to? Because if I do, the Mechanics Guild will immediately know that you have learned of it.”
    Colonel Faron nodded grimly. “It’s like arresting a spy the moment you learn of them. Or leaving the spy in place and feeding that spy only what you want them to know.”
    “You have done us a great service, Lady Mechanic,” General Shi said. “Would the Mechanics have shared the information gained here with the Mages?”
    “No,” Mari said, almost laughing at the idea. “Alain?”
    Alain gestured slightly toward the general. “Mages can learn your secrets by what is said—and by what is not said: by what you reveal in your voice, your face, the way you stand.”
    “We know Mages can spot lies,” Colonel Faron said. “But if we don’t voice a lie—”
    “It does not matter,” Alain said. “A Mage can see that you have not said something, that there is more left which you do not wish to speak, that by silence you seek to mislead. It is easy to read, for a Mage.”
    Once back in the smaller room, the old woman was told. She lowered her face into one hand for a long moment. “No wonder the Great Guilds have been able to outthink us time and again. We thought we had our secrets, our means of avoiding their tricks, but they only let us believe that. How many men and women have died because the Great Guilds knew our plans even as we made them?”
    Mari saw that the middle-aged man looked uncomfortable, and was not surprised when Alain called him on it.
    “You are unhappy,” Alain said to him. “But not for the same reason as the others.”
    Everyone looked at the man, who grimaced. “I would be a fool to lie to a Mage. Very well. I will say what is in my heart. I am grateful that the Lady Mechanic has done us this service. But she has done so by betraying the secrets of her Guild. I am concerned that someone willing to betray once may betray again.”
    Mari held up a hand to halt the outbursts that nearly came from the others. “I understand. Would it make you feel better to know that those secrets never really belonged to my Guild? My former Guild, that is. The Mechanics Guild stole those secrets. They were never supposed to be secrets. They were meant to be shared with everyone. I only gave you what your ancestors should have long ago received.”
    “If this is so, Lady Mechanic, you have my apologies,” the man said.
    “How do you know this?” the old woman asked.
    “I can’t tell you yet,” Mari said. “Someday I will be able to tell everyone. But I have seen the evidence. So has Mage Alain. The Mechanics Guild is built on the theft of its secrets from everyone else, and on the lie that commons cannot do the work that Mechanics can do. You can. I have proven it to be so.”
    “You will turn this world upside-down,” General Shi said.
    “Better upside-down,” Alain replied, “than broken as is Tiae.”
    “No argument there,” the