On Sat, 2003-03-08 at 10:45, S Lumley / s piotto wrote: > > That's a pretty good slap in the face for the house of Jhereg. Sure, they'll > throw wave after wave of assassins at him, but after he kills about fifty > of them, they're going to get tired of that and fork out the 50 million > imperials it will cost to bring Mr. Greymist out of retirement. (Man oh man > I cannot wait for THAT book. Sounds like the Last Contract to me...) Pretty much all the Vlad books are from Vlad's point of view, so I would consider _The Last Contract_ to be his last Contract, most likely one where he dies as a result of fulfilling the contract[1]. And considering its going to be the last novel, I figure the head he's after is going to be a major one. Possibly a Jenoine or the head Jenoine, but most likely a God(dess). Ever since I heard the title, my money's actually been on Vlad being hired to take out Verra. There are <= 17 people who can take out a God(dess), and Vlad's the only one who has a weapon that not only can do it, but is so good at it its named after the act.[2] However, another option has just occured to me. Vlad may be hired to take out the Empresses. However, we know Verilka doesn't die in office, and I really don't see Vlad taking a contract on Norathar. And there's also the possibility of Sethra, but again, I just don't see Vlad taking that contract. [1] He and his victim killing each other, or having to kill in such a way that he dies as well. [2] I was going to say the only one designed to kill the God(desse)s, however I believe at one point Sethra says they were all designed to kill the God(desse)s.