Heretic (The Sanctuary Series Book 7) by Robert J. Crane Read Free Book Online Page B

with its crystal tip and screwed the attachment upon it, the crystal sitting in the small gap in the middle of the metal, turning his staff into a deadly spear. “No need to pretend anymore, then. If you come at us, we will come at you with everything we have … and it will be considerably more than what you’re allowed, should you hew to your fancy rules.” He clunked the staff down and looked like a proper fighter with his spear. “So … come after this man, and you come for us all. Deliver that message to your cowardly leader who doesn’t have the balls to come tell us himself. And take this with you.” He tossed his vestments at her like the rest.
    “I will tell him what you have said,” Agora Friedlander said, her nostrils flaring in fury. “I will tell him what you have become. And you should know … it will change nothing. We will not stop.”
    “Neither will we,” Vara said, rising from her place at the table. “We have killed gods.” She smiled in cold satisfaction. “You idiots couldn’t even win your own wars without us. Consider carefully what you do now.”
    Agora Friedlander’s expression of rage disappeared in the twinkle of her return spell, and Cyrus sagged against the table, putting his hand to his face. “That was foolish. Utterly foolish, all of you.”
    “You’re welcome,” Vaste said. When Cyrus looked at him, the troll shrugged, dipping the point of his new spear. “This is Sanctuary. Doing utterly foolish things is our specialty.”
    “That and loyalty,” J’anda said, giving Vaste a pitying look.
    “Yes, and that,” Vaste agreed. “We combined the two, see.”
    “You’ve committed us to war,” Cyrus said, looking around the table, seeing the last hope of peace evaporate. He honed in on Ryin. “You, of all people … why?”
    “Because they’ve lied all along,” Ryin said, looking up from his spot at the table where he had returned to staring. “I don’t believe for a moment they would’ve offered you a painless death, or that they would have been content with only you. Trust a liar once, and it’s their disgrace if they break faith. Trust them again, and it becomes your folly.” He straightened up. “I don’t mean to be a fool again. They’ve lied about the nature of magic, they’ve lied about who can use it, and they would come for us with all they have, sooner or later, because knowing what we know makes us a threat to everything they’ve established.”
    “So it’s war,” Cyrus said, his voice nearly cracking. “Again.”
    “Sometimes you have to fight,” Ryin said, and there was a series of nods around the table. “And this … is most certainly one of those times.”

7.
    Cyrus and Vara ascended the stairs to the Tower of the Guildmaster in utter silence after the meeting of the Council broke. Cyrus stole careful glances at his wife. He could feel the storm brewing between them. It’s to be hard wind and lashing rains tonight, I suspect, he thought as he climbed the last few steps and followed her through the door to their quarters.
    He expected an explosion when he shut the door; when it did not come, he looked up the stairs to see Vara’s retreating back, her silvery armor disappearing at the top of the steps. He followed with some hesitation, listening to her boots strike against the stone floors with a steady cadence as she walked toward the wooden dummy that held her armor when she wasn’t wearing it.
    Cyrus slowly came up the stairs and looked after her. Vara was shedding her armor now, the breastplate and backplate already unfastened. They clanged against the ground with a hard rattle, and she undid her greaves and vambraces next, the chainmail beneath them rattling as she moved, undoing the latch points.
    Cyrus eased up the stairs into the tower. The doors were closed on all four balconies, battened down for the season to keep the chill out. So it’s to be silence before the storm breaks, then. One of the balcony doors rattled