That, and the fact that Thrawn had delivered Yiv alive for interrogation. Thalias had no idea what the Council and Aristocra had learned from him and from the datafiles they’d pulled from the Deathless, but Yiv had struck Thalias as the sort who loved to put his own brilliance on display, even if the only person allowed to see and appreciate that brilliance was himself. She had no doubt that the records of his self-indulgence included his precise plans for the Ascendancy.

“At least you’re getting better at politics,” she said. “Between the Aristocra and the Vaks, you’re learning how to play the game.”

Thrawn shook his head. “Hardly. Ar’alani and General Ba’kif are handling the dealings with the Aristocra. As to the Vaks, that was never strictly about politics.”

“I still don’t understand that part,” Che’ri said around a mouthful of food. “Everyone said they want to see all sides of things. But then they just took our side and attacked the Nikardun when we asked them to.”

“Actually, the solution also came from the admiral,” Thrawn said. “At the last moment, she saw something that I hadn’t.”

Thalias sat up a little straighter. “You missed something?”

“I miss many things,” he said. “And I did have part of it, of course. The Vaks want to see all the various points of view—all the different thought lines—just as everyone says. But those thought lines aren’t given equal weight.”

Thalias thought back to the artwork she and Thrawn had seen in the Primea art gallery. “But you said their artwork showed the whole thought line thing,” she objected.

“True,” Thrawn said. “But if all lines were given equal weight, their art would be a scribble of confusion, with no direction or focus.”

“So they decide which thought lines they like best?” Che’ri asked.

“Which ones they like, but more important which ones they trust. There’s really nothing surprising about that. No matter what people might say, they always make value judgments of the information and opinions they receive. They couldn’t function otherwise.”

“I see,” Che’ri said, brightening. “When you showed them that Yiv had stolen your message to them—that he lied—he stopped being someone they could trust.”

“Exactly,” Thrawn said. “Even worse from his point of view, as soon as that happened everything else he’d said became suspect.”

“So all his promises and negotiations went straight out the vent,” Thalias said.

“Correct,” Thrawn said.

“So what was it Admiral Ar’alani saw?” Thalias asked.

“She’d been looking into Vak history, and saw something odd,” Thrawn said. “For all the contempt their neighbors heaped on them over the years, on the grounds that they can’t make a decision, all of those neighbors have been very careful in their confrontations to never kill a Vak in combat.”