Page 47 of Scorched Earth
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.”
Felix shifted, eyes flicking to Teriana and then back to Marcus. “Yes, sir. I’ll have your guard wait outside the tent for when you’re finished up here.” Then he spun on his heel and strode out.
Teriana’s heart was racing, her pulse loud in her ears. Countless times during her journey back to Arinoquia, she’d practiced the speech she’d give when this moment came, but all those words seemed to have abandoned her. Still, she couldn’t lose this chance. “Quintus, do you mind giving us a moment alone.”
“I’ll—”
“Quintus will remain.” Marcus’s eyes were fixed on the ground between them.
She blinked. “This isn’t the sort of conversation that needs an audience. I want to talk to you alone.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want to be alone with you!” He finally looked at her. His blue-grey eyes were swollen and bloodshot, one still bruised from his fight with Carmo in Celendrial, but it was the edge of panic in his voice that made her chest clench. “It’s not appropriate,” he added, as though that made things any better.
“So, I’m to be your…escort?” Quintus rocked on his heels. Though he’d been the one to kill Ashok, he was almost devoid of blood splatter, whereas Marcus was covered in it. “Here to keep you two star-crossed lovebirds from falling into bed together again?”
“I said that you would remain, not that you would speak.” Marcus crossed his arms over his bare chest, scowling. “Stand there and be quiet.”
Quintus rolled his eyes, and as though to be contrary, sat on one of the benches with his bloody gladius rested across his knees.
Teriana felt abruptly unsteady, legs weak beneath her. “I want you to explain yourself.”
Marcus stared at her, then said, “You wantmeto explainmyself? Perhaps we might start with an explanation of why you and the Fifty-First are in Arinoquia.”
“Because I met with Cassius and that was part of the deal. Which you might consider thanking me for because if we hadn’t arrived when we did, there wouldn’t be enough left of you to fill a jar!”
Silence stretched.
“You met with Cassius? What… what did he say?”
“A lot of things,” she snapped. “But so did I.”
Marcus’s jaw worked back and forth, but it was not words of gratitude that emerged. Not that she’d expected them.
“You entirely ignored my instructions for you to remain withValerius in Celendrial and then brought a child legion to Arinoquia with you.”
“You’re not my commander.” Her temper shoved aside her nerves. “You have no right to tell me what to do. You have no authority over me.”
“You’re right, I’m not your commander,” he spat. “I’m your captor. And you’re my prisoner. Which means I have total authority over you.”
“Don’t you dare.” She closed the distance between them. “Don’t you dare reduce what’s between us tothat.Not after what we’ve been through together. You don’t get to tell me that you love me and then run away with no greater explanation than your belief that I’llsomeday hate you.It’s not good enough.”
“To protect you, that’s why!” he shouted. “I had Hostus’s men on my heels, knew I was going to risk turning my brain to jelly with the number of stems I had to go through. Never mind riding without an escort through rebel territory in Bardeen, plus traveling through a dubiously mapped xenthier stem into yetmoreenemy territory. You were safer in Celendrial. Safer with Valerius. Most certainly safer with an entire ocean between the two of us.”
All of that was probably true, but it was the last part… She rose onto her toes so that they were eye to eye. “So after endless months of keeping me as close as possible for my safety, it’s suddenly better for us to have an ocean between us? Why?”
