Heretic (The Sanctuary Series Book 7) by Robert J. Crane Page A

willingness to fight this fight, fears that leading her nation into war with me wavering would be foolish. And I don’t blame her. I can’t see a path to victory from where I stand.” His admission rang in the empty air of the tower as the door to the nearest balcony creaked in the night. The sun was down, and now darkness swept into the room, the torches having lit on their own some time ago. “How am I supposed to lead these people when I have no idea what to do? When my only inkling of a plan is to line them all up and charge into impossible battle?” Her hand rested on his face. “What do I even do, Vara? Other than despair, which seems to be costing me more than it is worth in this moment?” She stared into his eyes with her bright blue ones. “I don’t know how to win this fight. And I don’t know how to even fight it with what we have left.”
    “Then perhaps it’s time to count on your friends,” came a voice from near the balcony. Cyrus leapt to his feet, as did Vara, both their swords drawn instantly. A cold tingle of fear broke over Cyrus’s skin as his new blade, still foreign to him, rattled in his grasp.
    Terian stepped out from behind the balcony door, Alaric’s helm clutched beneath one arm, and the Battle Axe of Darkness in his other hand. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to interrupt all this grim despair, but we need to talk.”
    “We talked earlier,” Cyrus said, feeling himself relax only an inch at the sight of Terian. His eyes fell to the axe, and the cold chill on his skin did not subside. With that in hand, and me with this sword … he could massacre us.
    Terian’s gaze followed Cyrus’s and a flicker of amusement danced across his lips. “I know what you’re thinking, but I didn’t come here to kill you, dumbass. I’m here to help you.” He tossed the axe deftly toward Cyrus, who caught it, fumblingly, with his free hand.
    “As did we all,” Cattrine said, stepping out from behind the door with Terian, a spell of invisibility casting her in a faded light. Cyrus could see her, ghostly clear, as she lingered next to Terian.
    “Who said that?” Vara asked, sweeping her gaze piercingly toward the source of the voice. She murmured a spell under her breath to give her sight past illusion, and then she made a faint grumbling sound. “Oh, it’s you.”
    “Sorry,” Cattrine said, the veil of invisibility still shading her. “I can’t remove a spell once it has been cast upon me. But … we need to talk.”
    “I talked with both of you not but a few hours ago,” Cyrus said, clutching the axe in his hand.
    “We talked in public,” Terian corrected him. “We said things, mouthed platitudes meant to be circulated in rumors that would make their way back to listening ears outside our own nations. Now … now we need to have a real conversation. Eye to eye, with no outside listeners.”
    Vara looked at him with practiced disdain of the sort that Cyrus had become very familiar with in his first years of knowing her. “And what do we need to talk about now, in secret, under the cloak of darkness—and how did you sneak into the tower?”
    “Falcon’s Essence,” Terian said with a grin.
    “Should have been stripped when you crossed the wall,” Vara said suspiciously.
    “It was,” Terian agreed. “Which is why Bowe recast it before we climbed to the top of the tower, we three.”
    “How did you get through our guards at the wall?” Cyrus asked with suspicion of his own.
    “Your defense is porous,” Terian said. “I own the loyalty of several of your guildmates on duty right now.” He held up a hand to stifle the outrage that started to pour from both Cyrus and Vara. “Trust me … this is good.”
    “It’s good that you have spies in our midst?” Vara beat Cyrus to the nasty accusation. “We’re your allies.”
    “Yes,” Terian said, nodding, “which is why I’ve got them watching Sanctuary, trying to find out who within these walls is loyal to other