Page 26 of Scorched Earth (Dark Shores #4)

TERIANA

An icy shiver coursed through Teriana as though the breath of the Corrupter himself had brushed the back of her neck. Her pulse fluttered like a caged bird in her throat, fear freezing her tongue in place.

The man who’d kidnapped her and held her prisoner all those long months ago had been young, his hair inky black and skin smooth, but the moment Teriana heard the old Gamdeshian speak, there’d been no doubt in her soul who he was.

Ashok.

And he held Marcus’s bare arm in his grasp.

“Get your hands off me!” Marcus snarled at the corrupted, trying to shake him loose, but Teriana saw what he did not. Ashok’s eyes pooling black, a ring of flame beginning to glow around them.

Already stealing Marcus’s life.

“Marcus!” Her mind raced for a way to warn him that wouldn’t alert Ashok that he’d been discovered. Latching onto a language there was no chance Ashok spoke, she said, “Corrupted!”

Marcus’s eyes widened, but Felix reacted faster.

In a blur of motion, his gladius was in his hand and swiping through the air. It bit into Ashok’s forearm, severing it in a spray of blood that struck Titus in the face, blinding him. Marcus fell back. His head cracked against Felix’s breastplate, and the whole tent turned to chaos.

Ashok shrieked in agony and fury, moving with incredible speed as Felix closed in for the kill.

The corrupted snatched hold of Titus by the throat, using him as a shield to block Felix and the other encroaching legionnaires.

Titus struggled, but with each second that passed, the corrupted grew younger.

And Titus older.

“He’s killing him!” she cried. “He’s draining Titus’s life!”

Titus fought to get free, but Ashok wrapped his wounded arm around the legatus’s waist, binding his weapon to his side. Teriana screamed as she watched the corrupted’s forearm healing, growing, reforming first wrist then hand even as Titus’s face morphed into a near replica of his father’s.

But Ashok didn’t stop there.

As he backed against the tent wall, Titus’s face wrinkled and sagged, his muscular body deteriorating under his armor until what slumped in Ashok’s arms was a wizened old man, the corrupted young and whole again.

It had happened in seconds.

Ashok plucked the gladius from Titus’s grip and sent the legatus toppling to the ground, now possessed of speed and strength that only a warrior marked by Tremon himself could face. He grinned, eyes fixing on Marcus, and Teriana screamed a warning.

Only for Ashok’s eyes to bulge in shock, the tip of a gladius protruding from his forehead.

Howling, the corrupted pulled himself free of the blade. Blood poured down his face as he whirled to face the long slice that appeared in the canvas.

Quintus stepped through.

He was already swinging as Ashok reached for him, and her friend chopped the creature’s head clean from its shoulders.

Ashok’s body fell to the ground with a thud. Blood flooded from his severed neck with one, two, three great gouts before his heart went still.

For long seconds, no one moved, and then Felix was shouting orders. Marcus pulled away from the protective circle that had surrounded him to fall to his knees next to Titus, rolling the now ancient man onto his back. “Get Racker!” he shouted.

Oh gods.

Titus was still alive.

Teriana rushed toward him, trying and failing to ignore the decapitated head on the ground. Which was impossible given the corrupted’s lifeless face was aging.

Titus wheezed, “What did he do to me?”

“You know damn well what he did,” Teriana snapped. “You knew he was Ashok, which meant you knew exactly what he could do. You just didn’t think your own dog would bite you.”

“Ashok?” He stared at her, rheumy eyes filled with such confusion that Teriana wondered if the corrupted had also stolen his wits.

“Yes, Ashok,” she said. “Unless you’ve forgotten the man you conspired with to have me kidnapped. The man who threatened to send me back in pieces if Marcus didn’t retreat from Aracam. The plot that nearly saw the legions trapped between two armies. Remember that?”

Next to her, Marcus let out a slow breath, but she didn’t care if he was annoyed with her outburst. What she cared about was that even on his deathbed, Titus was still gods-damned lying like he could somehow get out of this alive.

“You think I—” Titus broke off in a wheezing cough that shook his fragile body. “No,” he finally gasped out. “Wasn’t. Me.”

“I know it was you, Titus,” Marcus said.

“Ashok was paid with Cel dragons, which I forbade being brought across the seas. Dragons that were stamped with Cassius’s visage, which were not in circulation when we left.

To whom else would Cassius give them but his own son?

You put your own legion at risk in your quest for power. ”

Titus studied him for a long moment, then he asked, “You truly believe I’d do something that stupid ? You really think I’d risk my men just to make you look bad?”

Unease prickled across Teriana’s skin, because if not Titus, then who?

Racker chose that moment to arrive, the surgeon uttering several colorful curses at the sight of Titus. Kneeling next to the legatus, he pressed fingers to his throat, then gave Marcus a shake of his head. “He’s dying.”

If the revelation terrified Titus, he didn’t show it. “From the moment we met, you thought the worst of me, Marcus,” he whispered. “Was it because he’s my father? If you want the truth, I hate him. He murdered my mother.”

Teriana tensed, it suddenly dawning on her how little she truly knew about Titus. That he was Cassius’s son was no secret to anyone, yet not one of them had ever asked for his opinion of his father.

“No. It’s because you’re manipulative, backstabbing, and power-hungry,” Marcus retorted.

“And you’re not?” Titus let out a wheezing laugh that turned into gasps for air. “Every legatus fits that description, even the puppy they’ve sent you to train. It’s how we get to the top.”

“But you made it personal,” Marcus said in a low voice. “I know the gold came from you, Titus. I know if I have your tent searched that I’ll find the rest of it. Do you really want your last words to be lies?”

“You’ll find more gold in my tent.” Titus’s skin was blanched pale.

“I won’t deny that. But I’m no traitor to pay the enemy to do my dirty work.

I paid one of your men to spy on Teriana for me.

” Titus sucked in a rattling breath. “He hates your girl, Marcus. Hates you breaking the rules. Can’t say I’m shocked he risked his own brothers, but it wouldn’t have been to ruin you.

It would have been to give you a chance at redemption. ”

“Who?” Marcus demanded. “Give me his name, Titus, or I swear that I’ll have you buried in the latrines.”

Titus grinned, his gaunt face twisting in a way that made Teriana cringe. “Kiss. My. Ass.”

It was as though the defiance stole the last vestiges of his energy, for the second the words passed his lips, Titus’s eyes rolled back in his head and his body began to shudder. “Tell my father… tell him. Tell him that—”

What final words Titus wished passed on to Cassius died with him, for only a rattling breath exited his lips.

Then he was still.

Racker reached forward and drew Titus’s eyelids down, but no one spoke.

Teriana looked around, finding the tent had been cleared of nearly all the men.

Lev, who was Titus’s second—now the acting legatus—was the only member of the Forty-First remaining.

He stared at the corpse of his commander, then cleared his throat. “What are your orders, sir?”

Silence stretched, the tension in the tent so thick it was hard to breathe.

“Arrange for him to be buried with full honors,” Marcus eventu ally answered. “Mark him in your books as a casualty of war, dead at our enemy’s hands.”

“Yes, sir.” Lev stooped, picking up Titus’s fragile body, but then he paused. Looking down at Marcus, he said, “I… I don’t want to be in command. I don’t have the stomach for it.”

Marcus’s face was emotionless as he regarded Titus’s second, then he said, “Felix will lead the Forty-First until such time as the Senate can address the chain of command. You will serve as his second.”

Relief flooded the young man’s eyes. “Thank you, sir.”

At Marcus’s nod, Lev departed, Racker following with mutters about examining the body.

“This isn’t how it’s done,” Felix said quietly. “The Forty-First needs to be under the command of one of their own.”

“He’ll rally.” Marcus rubbed at the back of his skull, wincing. “Until then, they need a steady hand, and I need certainty that they’ll do as they’re told.”

No one spoke, and Teriana took a moment to note who remained in the tent. Marcus and Felix. Servius and Quintus and Nic. Ashok’s headless corpse.

Marcus swayed as he rose to his feet, and Teriana reached to steady him, but he jerked away, refusing to look at her.

Hurt stabbed her heart, although this was exactly what she’d anticipated from him. Marcus had drawn a line in the sand, and he would not take her leaping across it with grace. But neither would she take his behavior lying down. “I need to speak to you.”

“Later,” he muttered. “Servius and Austornic, I want everyone busy with something. Drills. Patrols. Cleaning gear. Running laps. I don’t care what, just not sitting around.

The last thing we need is three legions with too much time to gossip.

” The pair saluted and left, and Marcus turned to Felix.

“What are the chances the real traitor still has some of that gold?”

Felix tipped his head side to side. “It’s possible. But just as likely that it’s made its way into circulation. I can have the centurions run searches. Give them a list of contraband, including coinage, which might give us a few leads.”

“Do it now,” Marcus ordered. “Word will spread soon enough, and if he’s smart, he’ll get rid of any dragons he has left. We need to catch him before that happens.”