Hi, Vlad's favorite restaurant is called Valabar and Sons--not Valabar's? "Valabar and Sons has existed for an impossibly long time. It was here in Adrilankha before the Interregnum made this city the Imperial Capital. That's hundreds of years, run by the same family. The same family of humans. It was according to all reports, the first actual restaurant within the Empire; the first place that existed as a business just to serve meals, rather than a tavern that had food, or a hotel that supplied board for a fee." The Book of Taltos, Taltos, Chapter 13, page 136. Is there a text reference to the Jhereg not "working" in Valabar's. Because the following text could be interpreted to be just leave the restaurant alone--not the patrons inside. Like those in power telling Sethra the Younger that when she kills all the Easterners in South Adrilankha and Adrilankha, leave the staff of Valabar's alone. "There must be some sort of unwritten law about the place that those in power know, something that says, "Whatever we're going to do to Easterners, leave Valabar's alone." It's that good. Same page. I thought Vlad would be allowed to eat his last meal in Dzur and when be attacked when he gets outside. Now I wonder if that thought was based on an "unwritten law" that did not even mean what I thought it meant. We will find out for sure in spring 2006. Bye. Linda G.