Free The Warlord's Legacy by Ari Marmell Page B

it, too
.

    “You had damn well better,” she growled, “have a very good explanation for this.”
    “
I
should?” he asked. “Aren’t you the one who should have handed it in when you first found it?”
    Her flinch was almost invisible, a mere tightening of the lines at the corners of eyes and lips, but it was enough to tell Cerris he’d struck home. “I don’t need an enlisted man telling
me
what my responsibilities are!” she hissed at him.
    “Look,” he said, raising his hands, palms out, “I’m not here to make trouble for you. I’m sure we can come to an, ah,
equitable
arrangement. You keep your toy, I keep my knowledge to myself.”
    “First things first: I want to know how you even
know
about this.”
    Here it is
. “I recognized it,” he lied. “There’s more about it that stands out than just the carved figures.” Carefully, slowly, he stepped nearer to her side. “Look here,” he said, pointing at the mace’s head. “Do you see that?”
    Furious, paranoid, suspicious, well trained … And still, for just that fleeting instant, her eyes left their careful appraisal of this mysterious soldier, flickering to the weapon to see whatever it was he’d indicated.
    The first swift blow, his bent knuckles against her throat, wasn’t lethal. But as her hands rose of their own accord, grasping at her neck even as she gasped for air, Cerris’s other hand dropped swiftly to his waist, then outward. The dagger had already drunk of so much blood that night, but clearly it was not sated. Liquid warmth poured over his hand as he shoved and twisted, wiggling the blade up and around beneath Liveln’s ribs until it was only the weapon itself that held her upright.
    Cerris let the body fall, carrying the dagger with it, for his hands were already reaching to claim another, far deadlier weapon. Beneath his palm rose a flush of heat like the bare skin of a passionate embrace. He felt the familiar twisting, wriggling in both his fist and his mind as the Kholben Shiar assumed the form of a heavy-bladed axe, whispering in a seductive voice as familiar as his own.
    Sunder
.
    And almost inaudibly amid his torrential thoughts, that
other
voice. ‘
I’m sure you two will be very happy together.
’
    His hands wiped clean on Liveln’s tunic, Cerris slipped into the hall—closing the door behind him, of course—and strode casually from the fortress. The guards barely glanced at him as he passed, and if any were keen enough of sight and memory to note that he wore a different weapon than he’d had on the way in, none of them thought anything of it.

    A XE HANGING AT HIS SIDE , Cephiran tabard now wadded up beneath one arm, Cerris stepped through the back door of Rond and Elson’s, an innocuous shop at one end of Rahariem’s central bazaar. He nodded to several men as he passed, recognizing them from Irrial’s household, and entered what was clearly a workroom, filled with a multitude of tools and several half-finished barrels.
    “A cooper’s,” he said with a smile, recalling their very first conversation. “Very nice, my lady.”
    Sitting on a workbench, Irrial smiled brightly. “It seemed appropriate,” she said. Then, to her other companion, “Rannert, would you mind?”
    The old butler rose and departed without casting so much as a glance Cerris’s way.
    “You got it?” she asked, rising and stepping toward him.
    “I did.” He held his breath as her eyes passed over the axe, but while they widened slightly, taking in the sight of the legendary weapon, they showed no recognition. Repressing a sigh of relief, he looked about once more. “This is a good place … You own it?”
    She nodded. “Rond and Elson rent from me.”
    “I figured. It’s a viable hiding spot, but there’s still an awful lot of confusion. This might be our best chance to escape Rahariem, if we—”
    “Cerris,” Irrial told him softly, reaching out to take his hand. “I’m not leaving