“I think I’ll flex some of my powers this time. Show them we’re not fucking around.”
Rydon groaned. “Can I convince you otherwise? Gabe and I can sneak inside and grab Sonah before the duke knows she’s missing. We’ll get the amulet too. I swear.”
“Oh, I’m not worried about the amulet just now. I’m here for Sonah. Besides, I have something better in mind,” Terena said with a smile.
She turned as Lerek, hands bound and a gag in his mouth, stopped several feet away with Gabriol’s large hand wrapped around his arm.
“Bring him.”
Terena staredup at the plain stone walls surrounding the city. The gates were closed, and the path leading up to it empty.
Helmed soldiers armed with spears, shields, arrows and spikes stared down at them. No one moved in the eerie dawn, and for a moment, Terena imagined they were just another fortification. Statues created to terrify rather than real men.
It mattered not.
Today, Terena was the one that would terrify.
“Lord Galen,” Terena called up, her eyes scanning the line of soldiers for the duke. “Step forward.”
Rydon’s mount nickered at her side. Nyx stamped a hoof. On her left, Lerek grumbled something she couldn’t hear.
Terena waited, but the duke didn’t present himself.
“What now?” Rydon muttered.
Ignoring him, Terena shifted in her saddle and sighed. “Lord Galen! Do not make me wait. Come now.”
Still, no movement from the city walls.
Terena frowned, then leaned forward to look past Rydon to where Captain Soros sat astride his warhorse. Terena gave the man a tight nod, and the captain leered in response.
Holding out his hand, one of his men strode forward with a spear. Handing it up to the captain, Soros hefted it for a moment before cocking his arm back and thrusting it up and forward.
Terena watched with a slight sneer as the spear slammed into the throat of a soldier. A roar sounded behind her as the manfell from the wall walk and, for the first time that morning, the soldiers atop the walls moved.
Terena flashed Soros a grin and he sketched a bow.
Hermes’s captain was not a god like them, but he was not mortal, either. Whenever she’d asked Hermes about him and the cadre of criminals he surrounded himself with, the god became dismissive. She admitted she didn’t care enough to pry further; just grateful he was on their side.
More movement drew her attention back to the city walls as soldiers separated to let a heavily armored man through.
“You bitch!” The man screamed down at her. “How dare?—”
“Is that you, Galen?”
The man paused, then shouted back, “No, I am not. I?—”
Terena again looked at Soros, who had another spear in his hand. She’d turned back to the large man who’d screamed down at her when the spear caught him in the side of his throat, along with two others who were regrettably standing nearby.
“I can do this all day, Galen,” Terena yelled up. “Show yourself. Better yet, bring me Sonah Yahn. That’s all I want. I will leave without further bloodshed if you bring her out.”
Movement along the wall to her left caught Terena’s eye. A tall man of slender build came forward, one gauntleted hand on the wall ledge. Terena narrowed her eyes, waiting. After a moment, the man took off his helm, his thinning wheat-colored hair standing on end as he scowled down at her.
“I will not open the gates for you, you traitorous bitch,” the man screamed out. “You are here without provocation or invitation. If you do not leave now?—”
“I have Crown Prince Lerek,” Terena called out, her frustration at how long this had dragged on showing in the shrill tone of her voice. She closed her eyes for a second, then looked back up at the new duke. “So it’s an even trade. Sonah Yahn for the prince.”
“Crown Prince Lerek is dead!”
