The Burning Hand by Scarlett D. Vine

Author:Scarlett D. Vine [Scarlett D. Vine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scarlett D. Vine
Published: 2023-11-09T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 38

Bethrian

The next morning, Bethrian went to visit Cylis to bask in their accomplishments. They had the magical sword. Well, a piece of it. But that piece was apparently enough. And now he had the life experience necessary to write a character in a future Passionflower novel who was a thief. A thief who stole valuable jewels—and maidenheads. A true artist never passed up a chance for inspiration.

So, while Bethrian wouldn’t be keen to visit Cylis under normal circumstances, their victory was enough to put a spring in his step after Fer the Soul Carver mumbled Cylis’s invitation.

But much like the fantasies he spun as Peony Passionflower, reality was a bit more underwhelming.

“That’s it?” Bethrian asked, staring at the metal shard on the rough wooden table. The shard was half the length of a rolling pin, jagged and sharp. That part was obvious—it was a piece of a sword. The surprising part was that other than some weird markings on the metal, it looked the same as every other weapon.

“Yup, that’s it,” Cylis said, sitting on the chair, arms crossed. Marva sat on Cylis’s bed, watching the exchange with her mirrored eyes. Fer had left them alone, telling Cylis to do his own errands next time.

“No chance that this is—”

“No, Fuckwit,” Cylis said. “It’s the sword.”

“It feels…charged to us,” Marva said. “Trust us. This isn’t a normal piece of metal. Besides, why else would the lord go through the trouble of putting this in a safe?”

“There was nothing else in it?”

Cylis shrugged. “Some rings, some stones. I threw them out the window.”

The lord in Bethrian groaned at the lost valuables. “Could have given them to me.”

“You were the one who said they’d be looking for a jewelry thief. Better we don’t have those jewels if they look our way.”

Bethrian wasn’t thinking clearly when Cylis was the voice of reason. “So, this is the sword. How’s that supposed to be of any use?”

Cylis shrugged. “No idea. It’s not like we can ask the blacksmiths here to make a hilt for it or anything—too many questions.”

That would engender too many questions. But to put the shard to use at the mountain, Caes would presumably have to hold the thing, and this thing was sharp. Too sharp. Bethrian sat on the chair, staring at the little piece of metal that had caused them all so much difficulty. Despite knowing what it was, Bethrian felt nothing. No shiver. No tremor. He even tried to embrace his inner Soul Carver and imagined he hated everything—still nothing.

Oh, well. Bethrian was talented at many things, but esoteric sensing wasn’t one of them, unfortunately.

“How’d you ever get the safe open?” Bethrian asked. “It was solid.”

“Kerensa,” Marva said. “She said in her prior life she developed certain…skills.”

“I see.” Bethrian bit back a smile. It warmed his cold heart to think of the Soul Carver picking open the lord’s safe. “Where’s Kerensa now?”

“With Caes,” Cylis said. “Sabine is visiting and she asked Ker to be her guard while Alair presumably gets some rest.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.