A Practical Guide to Conquering the World (The Siege, #3)

by K.J. Parker

Our department consisted of the ambassador, his airhead nephew, someone else’s airhead nephew and me; just as well there was never anything for us to do, or it wouldn’t have got done.

I was lost for words. Nobody had ever even suggested I might be good at anything before. Up till then, all people had ever done was urge me to try and do better at everything, with the implication that the room for improvement was a vast desert or steppe, stretching away into the distance as far as the eye could see.

I shuffled my feet. I had nowhere in particular to go, but her company made me anxious to go there.

“I’ve had a lot of trouble in my life. It’d be greedy and selfish to want any more. It might mean someone else having to go without.”

“She wants to know about the money.” “Lie to her,” I said. “She’s incredibly suspicious.” “Lie convincingly.”

All the clever things you say turn out to have been said by someone else.

Echmen medicine is so much better than anywhere else. They have cures that frequently work and doctors who sometimes make you better. Rather startling for someone brought up on Robur medical practice, which tends towards the view that the doctor’s job is to help finish what nature started.