Cursor's Fury (Codex Alera #3)(34)

He wished Kitai was here to talk to.

But for now, he had a job to do. Tavi read his orders again, recalled the camp layout Max and the Maestro had made him memorize, and went to work.

Isana awoke to a sensation of emptiness in the rough, straw mattress heside her. Her hack felt cold. Her senses were a confused hlur of shouts and odd lights, and it took her a moment to push away the sleepy disorientation enough to recognize the sounds around her.

Boots raced on hard earth, the steps of many men. Grizzled centurions bellowed orders. Metal scraped on metal, armored legionares walking together, brushing one another in small collisions of pauldrons, greaves, swords, shields, steel armor bands. Children were crying. Somewhere, not far away, a war-trained horse let out a frantic, ferocious scream of panic and eagerness. She could hear its handler trying to speak to it in low, even tones.

A breath later, the tension pressed in on her watercrafter's senses, a tidal flood of emotion more powerful than anything she had sensed in the dozen or so years since she and Rill, her water-fury, had found one another. Foremost in that vicious surge was fear. The men around her were terrified for their lives-the Crown Legion, the most experienced, well-trained force in Alera, was drowning in fear. Other emotions rushed with it. Primarily excitement, then determination and anger. Beneath them ran darker currents of what she could only describe as lust-and of another emotion, one so quiet that she might not have noticed it at all but for its steady and growing presence; resignation.

Though she did not know what was happening, she knew the men of the Legion around her were preparing to die.

She stumbled up off the mattress, dressed in nothing but her skin, and managed to find her blouse, dress, and tunic. She twisted her hair into a knot, though it made her shoulders and back ache abominably to do it. She took up her plain woolen cloak and bit her lip, wondering what she should do next.

"Guard?" she called, her voice tentative.

A man entered the large tent immediately, dressed in armor identical to that worn by the rest of the legionares, save perhaps for sporting an inordinate number of dents and scratches. His presence was a steady mix of perfect confidence, steely calm, and controlled, rational fear. He stripped his helmet off with one hand, and Isana recognized Araris Valerian, personal armsman to the Princeps.

"My lady," he said, with a bow of his head.

Isana felt her cheeks flush and her hand drifted to the silver chain around her throat, touching the ring that hung upon it beneath her clothing. Then she moved it down, to rest on the round, swollen tightness of her belly. "I'm hardly your lady," she told him. "You owe me no fealty."

For a moment, Araris's eyes sparkled. "My lady," he repeated, with gentle emphasis. "My lord's duties press him. He bid me find you in his stead."

Isana s back twinged again, and if that wasn't enough, the baby stirred with his usual restless energy, as though he heard the sounds in the night and recognized them. "Araris, my sister..."

"Already here," he said, his tone reassuring. The unremarkable-looking young man turned to beckon with one hand, and Isana s little sister hurried into the tent, covered in Araris's own large grey traveling cloak.

Alia flew to Isana at once, and she hugged her little sister tightly. She was a tiny thing who had taken after their mother, all sweetness and feminine curves, and her hair was the color of fresh honey. At sixteen, she was an aching temptation to many of the legionares and men among the camp followers, hut Isana had protected her as fiercely as she knew how. "Isana," Alia panted, breathless. "What's happening?"

Isana was nearly ten years her sister's senior. Alias furycrafting talents, like Isana's, ran to water, and she knew that the girl would hardly he able to remember her own name under the pressure of the emotions rising around them.