Free Captain's Fury by Jim Butcher

than her own. How many regrets did the old man have piled upon his aching shoulders? How much darker were the dreams that came to haunt him? How many times, over decades in the treacherous world of Aleran politics, had he longed for someone to turn to, to talk to, to lean upon—knowing that there was no one, and never would be. Not after the death of his wife and son, the last of the ancient bloodlines of the House of Gaius. Everyone looked at the First Lord and saw exactly what he wished them to see: the leader of the Realm, the power, and the riches.

    Only in the last year of working with him had Amara realized how unutterably alone Gaius truly was.

    It took extraordinary courage to lead the life he had lived, to endure in the face of all the problems, the enemies, the demands placed upon him. Even if she had the furycraft to do it, Amara would not be the First Lord for all the riches of Alera.

    She drew herself up, faced him squarely, and said, "I serve you, sire."

    Gaius regarded her intently for a moment, then briefly put a hand on her shoulder. "Countess," he said, "it is entirely possible that I am not worthy of such loyalty. Summon the coach."

    "Yes, sire." Amara raised one arm and flashed a hand signal at a group of Knights Aeris of the Crown Guard waiting on a nearby wall. The men secured harnesses to an aerial coach and lifted into the air, descending to the landing ground with the First Lord's coach, along with an escort of a score of Knights Aeris in the Crown's scarlet and blue. Gaius traded some words with the commander of the Knights, then entered the coach. Amara came in after him.

    Wind roared, and the coach rose up and away from the fortified town. Amara took a moment to regard the Elinarch, rising in a graceful arch over the grey-green waters of the slow, deep, steady Tiber. At one point in her life, Amara thought, she would have resisted anything but a direct command to ride in an air coach. After all, why ride when one could be reveling in the power and freedom of flight?

    Granted, that was before the First Lord had her flying over the entire width and breadth of the Realm for most of two years straight. After being worn to exhaustion, over and over again, Amara had come to the conclusion that perhaps a little bit of decadent relaxation while someone else did the heavy lifting might not be a bad thing. She had no intention of making a habit of it, but she'd worked hard enough to earn the occasional respite.

    Especially given how long it had been since she'd seen Bernard.

    Amara sighed. Bernard, her secret husband. Cursors were supposed to devote themselves solely to their duties. Cursors served the First Lord and the Realm, and their devotion was expected to be selfless and undivided—though, like active legionares , who were also supposed to remain unwed, Cursors generally took lovers. The only thing truly forbidden was marriage.

    Of course, that was precisely what she had done.

    Amara should never have allowed herself to fall in love with the formidable Count of Calderon. Regardless of how steady and caring he was, how strong, how handsome, how patient and loving, how passionate and skilled and—

    Amara's heart sped up, and she arrested her train of thought before she began to blush.

    If love was so easily overruled by banal reason, it would not be love.

    "Thinking of the good Count Calderon, Amara?" Gaius asked her. His eyes glittered with amusement.

    "You don't know it was him," Amara replied. "Perhaps I've taken a dozen new lovers by now."

    The First Lord's mouth quivered. Then he erupted into a rich, genuine bellow of laughter. It didn't last before he subsided, belly shaking, to stare out the window of the coach. "No," he said. "No, not you."

    Amara took a moment to compose herself. She often forgot that Gaius was as skilled at watercrafting as he was with fire or earth or metal. Worse, he was a perceptive individual who had been dealing with people two or three times as long as