Free Blade of the Lucan: A Memory of Anstractor by Greg Dragon Page B

then said, “Makk’s house is compromised, by the way. Your Felitian friends are very thorough in their whole, ‘keep the people on their toes thing.’ You may need to warn him.”
    “They murdered Makk and a few others last night, Marika. Thype them. You just get to the hotel tomorrow and I’ll take care of the rest,” Marian said, her voice low and dangerous.
    There was some silence as Marika absorbed the information. She couldn’t help but feel upset over the death of the pirate, Makk. He had been good to them and all for the sake of Rafian’s name. From the way Marian was talking she could tell she had taken it personally. She was putting things into action, and Marika hoped that it wasn’t her being rash over Makk’s untimely death.
    “Are you sure about this?” Marika asked, not liking the idea of entrusting her safety to a stranger.
    “The resistance is well connected here, Marika. It may be some time before we can meet up again, but at least there I know you will be safe until I am ready to move.”
    ~ * ~
    There was something magical about music, to the point that it defies all understanding. Music could conjure up memories of things long buried, and emotions once felt. Marian woke up to the sound of Meren’s Benevolent Symphonic Orchestra, and their popular rendition of “Savior,” a ballad dedicated to Palus Felitious and his rise to power. It was a song that used to soothe her as a child. It was full of horns, dominant trumpets that allowed space only for the strongest of string instruments and the big bad bass drum.
    It was a throwback to days of hard black boots on her feet, rapier dangling at her waist, and several officers hanging on her every word, ready to do her bidding. It was a song that brought her the memory of the day when she first admitted to herself that she was in love with the handsome rebel who broke into her house to escape her troopers.
    It was a memory of things she no longer wanted to admit about herself, her erratic mood and limitless hunger for things that a lady dared not admit. But she had gone hungry for years under Felitian rule, and when there came no man or woman that could satisfy that hunger, she had locked it away within, thinking such a partner did not exist.
    Could anyone blame her then, when a man the caliber of Rafian VCA crossed blades with her, not once, but twice, that she would not size him up that way? She was way beyond the season of such things, from a Tyheran perspective. Girls normally had a promised suitor by age sixteen, and most—if not all—would have been secretly rid of their virginity by the time they traded oaths on their eighteenth year.
    Marian had played around with boys and girls in one way or another prior to her eighteenth year. There was no ultimate suitor to unite houses or any such nonsense for her, but she had wanted the other naughtier things. She had wanted it so much that she developed a rather healthy appetite for it … partially because it was so frowned upon by her handlers. But a Baroness couldn’t be hopping into bed with would-be Lords of the Felitian Empire, now could she? So when her teenage years edged towards adulthood, she locked it away. Oh, how she hated locking it away, but after a stern talk with her mother, she had to do it to avoid embarrassment.
    It was at age twenty-one that she ran away with Rafian, the rebel. Twenty-one was the age when she should have been married, claimed, and with her first child—per custom, of course. But this strange rebel cared less for customs, and seemed more concerned about her beauty and fighting spirit than he was about babies, families, or the status quo. Could anyone blame her for giving up everything for him?
    She thought of how fearless he was when they’d first fought. Felitian soldiers—the ones she allowed to get within a sword’s reach of her—were soft, pampered boys who played at warrior. Rafian showed up as a tall, commanding body of muscle and sinew. For a girl