Nisi blood. Her idea of who’s worth what ain’t mine.”
The rabble behind and around laughed, but uneasily. The Tros at Tempus’s side pawed the ground and pulled upon its reins to loose them. He put out a hand to soothe the horse and a dozen blades or more cleared their scabbards with a snick audible even through the pelting rain, while the three crossbows he could see were centered on his chest.
“The wisdom is; Sanctuary is for lovers, not fighters, this season. Make peace among you, or the Empire will grind the lot into dust, and bury your flesh with corn to make it grow tall.”
“Crap, old man. I’d heard you were tough-not like the rest,” Zip spat. “But it’s the same garbage I hear from them. Tell it to your troops-the Whoresons and the
Turd Commando: They’re the ones causing all the grief.”
Tempus’s patience was near an end. “Boy, mark me: I’ll call them off you for a week-seven days. In it, you meet with the other factions and hammer out some agreement, or by New Year’s Day, the PFLS won’t be even a memory. Nor will you live even that long, to verify it.”
There was a silence, and in it someone muttered, “Let’s kill the bastard,” and someone else whispered back, “We can’t-don’t you know who that is?”
Tempus peered through the downpour and watched the flat face before him, emotionless and cold with rain streaking down it. There was strength in the youth, like the Enlibar steel some had thought would make a difference here-but, like the steel, Zip’s strength was too little and too late.