Page 244 of Scorched Earth

“Bardeen is in.” Silvara’s eyes met hers, beautiful in their defiance. “Fuck the Empire!”

Teriana smiled. “Fuck the Empire.”

94KILLIAN

Day after day, they’d kept up the act that they were at odds, but night after night, he and Lydia had done exactly what they promised. In the company of Finn, they hunted blighters down in the streets of Serlania, and Lydia liberated them from the Corrupter’s hold, filled them with life, and allowed their souls to retake control of their bodies.

Not all of them came back.

Lydia had wept in his arms the first time it had happened. It had been a man with a wife and two children, the Corrupter masquerading as a loving husband and father. All had gone smoothly, but after Lydia had filled him with life, unlike the others, he did not draw in a breath. His heart did not begin to beat, and after a few moments, the life she had put into him drifted out into the world.

“I made it worse for them,” she’d sobbed. “Now they have to endure without him with no explanation for how he died.”

The worst part of it was that she was right. The blighter had been performing his duties so as to blend in, working and securing food for his family, and without him, life would grow more difficult. “I’ll have Finn bring them food,” he said. “I’ll put them on his list.”

Hollow comfort given that a woman would find her husband dead in an alley, but it had not been Lydia who had killed him. Killian had cupped her tear-stained cheeks, wishing he could take away the grief in her heart. “It’s the risk we have to take. If we stop because we lost one, how many will lose the opportunity to get their life back? We have to keep going.”

Lydia had nodded, and then asked Finn, “Find me another one.”

Though more often than not, the souls came back into theirbodies, Lydia wept just as hard each time they did not. She had too big a heart for this world, but though Killian knew that it would go easier on her if she cared less, he wouldn’t have changed her. It was half the reason he loved her.

Night after night, they pressed onward while Helenenegotiatedwith Marcus. Malahi and Seldrid did their best to keep her from agreeing to everything the Cel wanted, but in the end, it was Marcus himself who put an end to it by sending a missive dictating a day to meet to finish the negotiations, as well as the location and allowance for numbers who would attend.

Yet they’d still heard no word from Teriana.

“By my reckoning, we have two choices,” Agrippa had said. “Either we put an end to this farce that Helene rules and send Marcus a letter telling him the deal’s off, or we let the game play on and give Teriana two more days to get the job done. If we go with the former, I’d suggest we light a fire under the giants and have them foul the seas to try to hold them back. Then we ride with every soldier we have to the front lines and carve our way through to that xenthier stem and get ourselves to Deadground. If we go with the latter, we need to figure out how we are going to fight two ships worth of legionnaires without losing most of Xadrian’s and Bercola’s warriors, because believe me, they won’t go down easily. And afterwards, we’ll have to ride with a fraction of the soldiers we had to the front lines to try to reach the xenthier and probably fail.”

“I’m getting the impression your vote is the former strategy rather than the latter,” Killian said. “Or did I misinterpret.”

“You are awfully lighthearted for a man who has been sleeping alone.” Agrippa’s eyes flicked between Killian and Lydia, then narrowed. “Or not. Gods, I don’t even want to know what you two have been up to.”

Killian shrugged. “Better you don’t know. But to the problem at hand, if we send a message to Marcus that the deal is off, how long until he sails in force to take what Mudamora is no longer freely giving?”

Agrippa crossed his arms and sighed. “Immediately, would be my guess. He always has contingencies, and he’ll plan for Mudamora to change its mind, even if he doesn’t think it’s likely.”

“Which brings us right back to where we stood before Teriana left.” Lydia toyed with the end of her dark braid, her eyes meeting Killian’s. “She needs more time. We haven’t given her enough time.”

“So you’ll risk your ability to reach Deadground to give her twomore days? Four, tops, because I suppose we can factor the time it takes for him to learn we played him dirty,” Agrippa asked. “Will you risk everything for four days?”

Lydia’s eyes hadn’t broken from Killian’s. “What does your gut tell you?”

The letter Marcus had sent Helene had said that he’d conduct the negotiations himself. Which meant that Killian might get a chance to put the bastard in the ground. “My gut says that we play this through to the end.”

“You’re underestimating them, Killian.” Agrippa put his head in his hands. “Even with you and Xadrian fighting, the cost of this will be higher than you think.”

“I’m not underestimating them,” he answered. “I just have a plan.”

The chance to cancel the negotiation had come and gone, and they’d still not heard any word from Teriana or any of the other groups making ready to attack at various places around the world. Agrippa believed it was because they’d failed.

Killian’s gut told him otherwise.

Yet his mind was not for Teriana and the battle she faced, but for the one he would soon face, so Killian pulled his thoughts from the past and focused on the scene before him. A table had been set up on the beach under a pavilion, white sand stretching for leagues in every direction before him and pasture stretching for leagues in either direction behind. Clear and open terrain that allowed neither party to hide additional forces without the other knowing it.

Behind the table stood two hundred Mudamorian soldiers, primarily men and women taken from the High Lords’ personal guards, and they stood nervously in the hot sun. Though no one spoke, it was far from silent with the way their feet shifted against the ground, armor and weapons clicking, all punctuated by the occasional cough.

At the table itself sat High Lord Pitolt, Helene, Lydia, and Killian. Helene radiated excitement, and every few minutes, she thanked Lydia for her generous sacrifice. Lydia, to her credit, hid her annoyance each time and always smiled and nodded. Pitolt was more aware of the stakes, and the man was sweating profusely and had refreshed his glass of lemonade twice.

“You are certain he will hold to the terms we have agreed to?” he asked Lydia for the third time. “The Cel abide by their word?”