Page 102 of Scorched Earth (Dark Shores #4)

TERIANA

As her crew made ready to leave Imresh’s small harbor, Teriana climbed to the quarterdeck and gripped the rail with her free hand, the other still holding tight to her letter.

“I’d ask if you’re all right, but the answer to that is clear enough,” her aunt said, then reached over to pat her arm.

Teriana jerked away from her aunt, then cringed at her reaction. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I just need to get away. I need to be on the open sea. It feels like I can’t breathe, Auntie.”

“I see that.”

“This letter grants our people freedom.” She swallowed the lump in her throat. “We need to bring it to Celendrial to give to the Senate. Get our people on ships. Retrieve Mum.”

“All right. Better put it somewhere safe, then.”

Her aunt stepped away from her, giving orders to the crew to raise sails.

Within moments, the Quincense was flying away from the coast toward the ocean path that would take the ship back east. Teriana retreated into the captain’s quarters, which smelled of cedar and orange blossoms. It smelled like home, and fresh tears poured down her face because this was not how a homecoming should feel.

Going to her mother’s desk, she unlatched the top drawer, carefully putting the letter into wax wrapping before storing it away.

Teriana turned to stare out the window, watching the coast of the Southern Continent slowly fade into the distance and then out of sight.

Yet the agony in her heart remained.

There weren’t words in any language that came close to capturing the magnitude of her grief. Her rage. Her guilt. For the combination was a beast without name, consuming her and dragging her down.

The cruelty of Marcus’s deception made her want to weep, but in truth it was her own actions that made her want to drop to her knees and scream.

She’d fallen in love with her best friend’s murderer.

Had given him every part of herself, body and soul, and never once suspected the depths of his villainy.

How had she not known? How had she not sensed that he’d been the one to hold Lydia under?

To put her down a drain like refuse, lost and unrecoverable for all of time? How had she failed Lydia so badly?

“Oh gods,” she whispered, her knees failing her. The impact of striking the deck rattled her spine.

Her braids swung back and forth, gold and blue enamel flashing in her periphery as the gift Marcus had given her brushed her cheek.

A shriek exploded from her lips, and Teriana wrenched at the hair ornament, trying to tear it from her braid. Pain lanced across her scalp, but the braid was woven tight and would not give. A moan emerged from her throat as she scrambled up, digging through the desk for a knife and finding nothing.

Bolting across the room, Teriana slammed open the door.

“A knife. A knife, I need a knife!” She snatched one off Polin’s belt and sliced it across her braid in a wild swipe.

The tip scored her cheek, but Teriana didn’t feel the pain as she sprinted to the rail and threw the length of her braid over the edge, watching the glimmer of gold disappear beneath the sea.

Lowering herself to the deck, she pressed her shoulders to the polished wood and wept.

“Teriana?” Bait’s voice filled her ears. “Listen, I—”

“Leave me alone,” she choked out. “I’ve heard enough for one day.”

“What did you do, Bait?” her aunt demanded. “I knew you were looking for trouble when you sneaked off the ship while we unloaded the injured. What did you say?”

“I went looking for her,” Bait snapped. “I found her in the bath with him. It’s true what everyone is saying about her. It’s worse than everyone says, because I heard Teriana tell him she loved him. So I told her that she was in love with the bastard who killed Lydia.”

“Stop.” Teriana squeezed her head between her hands, struggling to breathe. “Please, no more.”

“You idiot!” her aunt shouted. “I don’t suppose in your jealous little rampage that you bothered to tell her that Lydia survived?”

The sob exiting her throat caught, and Teriana gagged on it. “What?”

“Lydia survived.” Yedda knelt next to her, gripping her shoulders. “The hot spring flowed into a xenthier stem that brought her to Mudaire.”

Lydia was alive. A shuddering sob tore from her lips, because this couldn’t be real. Had to be a cruel trick.

Yedda’s grin widened, her eyes shifting from stormy seas of anger to bright blue in an instant. “But what should truly ease your heart is that the gods saw fit to unite her with Killian Calorian.”

“She’s with Killian?” Teriana sucked in a mouthful of air, the ship and sky and clouds all spinning. “Marcus didn’t kill her?”

“No. Not only that, she has been marked by Hegeria and she’s—”

“Kitaryia Falorn,” Teriana said quietly. “Valerius knew. As did Mum.” She eyed her aunt for a long moment. “As did you, I think.”

Yedda gave a slow nod, her grey braids swaying.

“I knew. But for all our efforts to keep her secret, I think it no coincidence that Lucius Cassius targeted her. As impossible as it might seem, the Corrupter’s reach has extended to the East, using Celendor’s might to aid in his bid for power.

Blight spreads from the North to create armies of the dead even as the legions claim the South.

Mark my words, Teriana, this is a battle for the liberty of Reath, and the Six are losing. We are losing.”

Just like in the vision Magnius had given her so long ago.

A great battlefield filled with the dead and the dying, banners of the Twelve Houses soaked in blood and crushed beneath the feet of an army with the burning circle of the Seven emblazoned on the flags they carried.

A fleet of ships, the golden Cel dragon flying high in the rigging, open seas ahead of them, darkness behind.

Magnius’s voice whispered up from her memories, Enemies approach from both sides.

“It’s my fault,” she said. “I opened the door.”

“This is a war between gods, and you are a mortal caught up in the battle,” her aunt said.

“There are no coincidences. Madoria silenced every one of our people who Cassius tried to question yet left your mind and voice free. She chose you as her champion, and I believe she set the stage to give you what you needed to fight.”

“The last thing I’ve done was fight.” There was no keeping the bitterness from her voice. “All I did was—”

Yedda gave her a shake. “You know the enemy better than anyone on this side of the Endless Seas, girl. You know how they function. How they fight. How they think . That is the most crucial component to knowing how to defeat them.”

How to defeat Marcus .

“All I have learned,” Teriana said, “is that beating him is impossible. Not even Kaira, who is marked by Tremon, was able to stop him. He took Emrant with a trick, Auntie. He’s every bit as good at war as the Senate claims, and the forces that he can bring to bear on the rest of Gamdesh are something never seen in recorded history.

If finding a way to defeat him was Madoria’s goal for me, I have failed. ”

No one spoke, her crew all standing motionless as her words sank in. The only sounds were the snap of the sails in the wind and the slap of the sea against the hull, her hopelessness infecting her crew.

Then drops of water misted her face, and something clattered on the deck. Teriana’s breath caught at the glimmer of gold and enamel, the tiny replica of the Quincense sitting in a puddle of seawater before her.

Madoria yet has faith in you, Magnius’s voice echoed in her thoughts as she reached out to pick up the hair ornament. You must have faith in yourself, and remember, you don’t stand alone.

The world around Teriana fell away and was replaced with a vision of the galley of the Kairense , where Bait sat across a table from Lydia and Killian.

Lydia’s spectacles didn’t fit her properly, her hair was dirty and her clothes worn, but her friend was smiling.

Laughing. Magnius’s memory, she realized, the demigod having watched through a porthole.

For a heartbeat, Teriana’s grief fell away, but as the vision faded, reality returned.

“Why didn’t Marcus tell me he didn’t kill her?” she asked Magnius as she stared at the ornament on the palm of her hand. “Why was he content for me to believe she was dead?”

It was Bait who answered. “Because he didn’t know.”

All eyes turned to him, and her friend shifted uncomfortably.

“And how might you be knowing that?” Yedda asked, her voice cool. “Had a bit of an exchange of words with the legatus, did you? Thought to twist the knife a little deeper?”

“I…” Bait shook his head. “I wanted him to know he doesn’t always win. That he didn’t defeat Lydia.”

Teriana closed her eyes, fear swimming in her stomach because while Marcus had said he had no interest in conquering more territory, she now wondered how much of that sentiment had been to appease her. To keep her. To control her. “So he knows about the xenthier path to Mudaire?”

“Yeah,” Bait replied. “He does.”

“You jealous fool of a boy.” Yedda’s brown skin flushed with anger. “If it were possible to drown you, I would.”

Fear gripped Teriana as she understood the true reach the Empire now had over Reath. East must not meet the West. And yet it had.

Closing her hand around the ornament, Teriana climbed to her feet. “We sail with all haste to Celendrial to retrieve our people, but then we sail to Mudamora to warn them that the dragon has the key to their back door.”

Bait stiffened, then said, “I think you know him better than you realize. Those are the exact words he used.”

Right now, it didn’t feel like she knew Marcus at all.

Teriana squared her shoulders, then shouted, “Full sail! The Cel legions move quickly, so the Quincense needs wings if we are to stop them!”