Gilded Serpent

the means and the opportunity to trade with other nations. Would allow them to thrive, if they were wise in how they used it.
Once all the imperators had reached the table, Marcus inclined his head. “Shall we sit?”
Pulling out his chair, Marcus settled into it, the metal of his armor clinking as he rested his forearms on the table, seemingly entirely at ease. The imperators followed suit, the representatives who’d assisted with the counting moving to stand behind their leaders. Teriana glanced up at Servius, and when the big legionnaire nodded, she took a few steps forward to stand at Marcus’s elbow.
“You’ve all been provided an account of Urcon’s treasury?” When the Arinoquians nodded, he plucked up a piece of paper from the table. “As confirmation, then. One hundred sixty bricks of gold. Two hundred forty-three bricks of silver…” He continued, voice holding all the emotion of one reading a market list. “Your representatives swear to the accuracy of these figures?”
“I swear it,” Ereni’s representative said, then stepped back. The chorus ran the length of the table, and then all their eyes flicked to her.
“Teriana?” Marcus asked, not looking up. “Is it accurate?”
Her palms were sweating and her throat felt bone dry, though there was no reason for it. The treasure was all accounted for. She’d watched it be loaded, had counted it as it had been unloaded, and yet unease twisted her guts like bad fish stew. “I swear it.”
“Good.” Marcus set aside the paper and picked up another. “As is your custom, the profits of this venture will be divided based on the number of fighting men and women whom you contributed to the collective force. Is this correct?”
“You know it is.” Ereni pushed her greying blond braid back over her shoulder. “I told you so myself, so let’s get on with it.” Rising, she rounded her chair and leaned on the back of it, eyes moving over her fellow imperators. “As agreed, we break it into fifteenths.” She rattled off the numbers, then said, “It is settled, then?”
Marcus coughed. “With respect, Ereni. I’m afraid I do not concur with your calculations.”
All the imperators turned to glare at him, and Teriana’s stomach dropped.
Picking up another piece of paper, Marcus eyed it. “You all provided me your numbers prior to the battle, and by my calculation, I am entitled to nine-fifteenths, or sixty percent of the profits of the taking of Aracam. Ereni, you are entitled to—”
Ereni jerked out her sword.
Before Teriana could even reach for her own weapon, the imperatrix had the blade pressed against Marcus’s throat, her wiry arm steady. “Stay where you are, girl. And you”—she pressed the blade harder, droplets of blood dribbling down Marcus’s throat—“tell your men to stay back.”
Behind her, Teriana could hear the legionnaires moving, but she didn’t dare look to see what they were doing.
“Servius.” Marcus’s voice was steady. “Hold.”
The men behind stilled to silence. Close as they were, there wouldn’t be anything they could do if Ereni decided she wanted Marcus dead.
Teriana lifted her hands, taking a shuffling step closer until the imperatrix’s glare stopped her in her tracks. “Ereni, please don’t do this. I know you’re angry, and I can understand why, but killing him isn’t the answer. Put away the sword and let’s negotiate.”
“Why am I not surprised that you’d try to negotiate for this thieving boy’s life?”
“Thieving?”
Marcus’s voice was brittle with anger, the first emotion Teriana had seen from him throughout this cursed meeting. He jerked to his feet, and only Ereni pulling back her sword kept him from cutting his own jugular. He rested his hands on the table, leaning across it. And though the rain hammered on the canvas above them, the splat splat splat of his blood dripping on the papers was all Teriana could hear.
“Allow me to remind you that you’d have none of this if not for my men. That if we had not arrived on your shores and offered you an alliance, all of this”—he gestured at the treasure—“would remain collecting dust in Urcon’s palace.”
“We didn’t need you to defeat Urcon,” Ereni snapped, but Teriana didn’t miss how her gaze went to the tabletop every time another drop of blood splattered against the papers.
“And yet you were content to use us for the sake of achieving it sooner.” Marcus tilted his head. “Out of desperation? Out of fear? Out of greed?” He laughed, the tone of it different than Teriana had ever heard from him, and it made her skin crawl. “Or maybe it was because it was easier to let me and mine take all the risks while you and yours planned to take all the reward.”
One of the other imperators leapt to his feet. “You’ve got balls, boy, I’ll—”
“Sit. Down.”
Though he was a hardened warrior, the imperator’s sun-darkened skin paled as he met Marcus’s gaze.
Splat.
The man sat, though Ereni remained on her feet, naked blade still in her hand.
“Since we arrived on your shores,” Marcus continued, “my men have fought to defend your lands and your people from Urcon and his raiders. Bled to achieve the peace you wanted. Though in hindsight, perhaps your goals were less lofty than I hoped.” His eyes flicked meaningfully to the treasure before returning to Ereni’s face.
Splat.
“Allow me to remind you that you wanted peace as well,” she said. “That you wanted to make our shores safe for your Empire’s trade. You have as much to gain from this as we do.”
“I do want peace in Arinoquia.” Marcus slowly panned the imperators. “And yet I don’t feel that I have it.”
Teriana’s pulse roared in her ears, her chest tightening as the tension in the group ratcheted up tenfold, the air so thick as to be nearly unbreathable. She understood now why Marcus had chosen this ground for the meeting, surrounded by stinking, smoldering piles of those his legions had slaughtered. Why they stood on ground soaked with blood.
Several of the imperators glanced toward the distant tree line, and Teriana knew what they were