Gilded Serpent by Danielle Jensen (top 10 novels txt) 📕

Hitting the top of the stairs, he turned to look down the hallway, his stomach plummeting when Teriana wasn’t waiting at the door. Which meant she was still out there.

He needed to find her, but he had no intention of going unarmed. Jamming the key into the lock and twisting it, he flung open the door.

And found Teriana standing by the fire.

“Thank the gods!” She crossed the room, shoving the door shut. “I thought they’d rounded you up with the others.”

“Cel citizens are exempt from the curfew,” he muttered. “How did you get—”

“The children,” she interrupted. “They were able to sneak me out of the square, and they showed me a back way into the inn. But you need to get out there and make this stop. These people can’t afford the fines—it will put half of them in debt to the Empire, and you know as well as anyone the rates of interest it charges.”

He did. Just as he knew that the Empire was more than happy for them to be indebted to it for the rest of their lives. “There’s nothing I can do.”

“Bullshit!” Teriana snarled, glaring at him. “There’s not a man out there who outranks you. And don’t give me the excuse that you don’t want Cassius to have warning we are coming. These people showed us kindness. We owe them.”

Marcus bit the insides of his cheeks, struggling to keep his anger in check, because Teriana wasn’t the cause of it. “We do owe them, but if I intervene, it will only make circumstances for them worse.” Striding across the room to the window, he scraped off the frost so that he could see the lines of Sibernese being fined in the square. “I can go down there and order them to allow the villagers to go back to their homes, and yes, because I outrank them, they’d have to abide. But I do not outrank their legatus, and his orders come directly from the Senate.”

He rested his forehead against the glass. “In a matter of days, these men would be back, and I assure you, they’d show no benevolence.” Just saying the word made his tongue sour. “I only have power when the Senate is unable to countermand me, and on this side of the world, that means I have no power at all.”

Her hands were balled into fists. “I hate them.”

Watching the legionnaires carrying out commands that he himself had been forced to give in a different time, in a different nation, Marcus felt guilt rise in his chest, bitter and foul. Especially knowing that he’d be forced to do so again. “So do I.”

 81KILLIAN

Meril’s, it turned out, was the general store. The proprietor seemed to have a deal with Agrippa as the provisions they’d need for the journey were already packed.

And the customers were waiting.

They were a mix of folk. Three men and one woman who looked like they might have been soldiers, given the way they wore their weapons. Two couples of varying age who bore only belt knives, a family of four that included two children. The boy and girl were perhaps six and eight by Killian’s reckoning, and they had wary looks in their eyes and kept close to their parents’ sides.

“Time to pay up your balance, travelers,” Agrippa announced, holding out his hand as he circled the group, collecting coins.

When he was through, he said, “This here is Tom—he works for me now. That’s his girl there, goes by the name of Gertrude. Don’t bother her or you’ll end up looking like Baird.”

“It’s true,” the giant said mournfully from where he was gathering up sacks of supplies.

“You all got the explanation of how this goes and the risks we face before you signed up, so I won’t waste words,” Agrippa continued. “But before we head out, I’ll remind you: we leave at dawn each day. If you’re not in the boat, you get left behind.”

Boat? Killian cast a sideways glance at Lydia, but her expression was equally confused.

“Being on the river gives us speed and makes it harder for the wildmen and other predators to get at us, so we don’t stop the boat for any reason. So you have to shit, hold it or stick your ass over the side, because I don’t stop for any reason.”

What sort of mad trek was this?

Yet for all Killian’s confusion, every customer nodded, then lifted their bags onto their shoulders.

“Then let’s go.”

Agrippa led them outside and around to the back lane, where Baird was loading the supplies into a sturdy wooden boat. It sat on skids, and a pair of mules stood chewing on their feed where they were hitched to the front of the contraption, a bored-looking boy next to them.

“Got everything?” Agrippa asked Baird, and when the giant nodded, he gestured at the boy. “Get them going.”

With the boat leading the way, they progressed through the streets of Deadground, then out of the town, heading west.

Lydia moved closer to Killian as they walked. “Did you know about this?”

“No,” he admitted. “I assumed we were going by foot.”

“It sounds dangerous.” Her head swiveled in the direction of the children. “Maybe you could find out more details about what we’ve gotten ourselves into. I’m going to try talking to the women to see if I can learn anything helpful.” Then without another word, she marched up to where the female soldier walked and introduced herself.

Rubbing at his aching head, Killian lengthened his stride until he fell in alongside Agrippa. “You didn’t mention the boat.”

Agrippa grinned and threw his hands up in the air. “Surprise!” Then he laughed. “Don’t look so worried. The rapids get a little wild in a few places, but it’s better than going by foot. And a damn stretch better than fretting about wildmen ambushes every ten paces.”

“If you do this with regularity, then don’t they try to ambush you on the water?”

“Oh, they do. And