The Centurion's Woman

Chapter 20

        "We have one half hour remaining," Alex replied, scrutinizing another knife. "How much?" she asked the merchant. Ixillius stayed quiet as she and Verus brow-beat the man into a lower price than Alex had planned to attempt. The merchant eventually looked up at him for some kind of relief, and Ixillius wrapped his free arm around his wife and kissed the top of her head. Once the price was settled, Verus dropped the needed coins on the table as Ixillius was reaching for his purse.

        "I have nobody to spoil but myself," Verus silenced the argument before Ixillius could start one. "I might as well decorate my sister with the pretty things she prefers."

        Alex kissed her brother's offered cheek and then hung her new knife at her belt. She hooked her arm through Verus's as they all turned from the table, ready to return to the encampment. Then she saw what she was apparently here to see. Down a small alley there were oriental wares, and men and women argued over silks and trinkets at the five carts.

        "What do you see?" Ixillius asked, noting Alex had stopped and curious what had caught her attention. The gross vertigo threatened when she considered walking away and pretending that she hadn't noticed, so Alex nodded her chin at the alley. Verus changed directions quickly, the silks catching his eye, and they walked over to see what this little corner of the market held. A man leaving the alley bumped into them and Verus pulled his purse from the hand of the thief. The fellow, wisely walking away rather than making a scene, bumped into Alex next and pulled open her cloak far enough for her jian to be clearly seen. He tried to lift the decorated hilt off her belt so she drove an elbow hard into the hinge of his jaw. He stared up from where he'd sprawled at their feet, tears in his eyes.

        "Watch for loose stones," Ixillius cautioned the people coming into the alley behind them as he pulled the thief to his feet by his tunic with one hand, and then lifted him off his feet so they were eye to eye. "I assure you, the stones are very hard," he threatened before tossing the thief into the street. A hand shot out from the crowd as Alex was pulling her cloak back to cover her shoulder, holding back the wool.

        "Where did you get that?" the old man from the sword-makers booth looked from the jian to Alex's face. "I never thought I would see that again." Verus moved to shove the old man away, but Alex stopped him.

        "I made a trade on the road from Bonna," she answered kindly.

        "Liar!" the younger man from the same booth stormed around the table. "A slave cannot trade for such a –"

        He made a grab for the jian and Alex knocked him flat. He stared up at her in shock, finally registering that she wore armor and a wedding ring with her collar.

        "I made a trade for the jian," she repeated, getting startled stares for using the correct word for the sword, and keeping her tone conversational, "on the road from Bonna."

        "We have been searching for this," the old man stroked the back of his fingers down the hilt as the younger man regained his feet. The younger man's temper broke and he yelled at the old man in their own language. In a show of disrespect that Alex hadn't seen so bad in years, the younger lashed the older about the shoulders with a switch. The old man retreated back to the booth and the girl who stood there. She was glaring with festering hate at the proceedings through a black eye that sat on top of swollen and scarred lips. The younger man turned back on Alex.

        "Hand over what you stole!" he demanded of Ixillius and Verus. Ixillius immediately bristled at the insult, Verus already starting a rebuttal that she didn't bother listening to. Alex pulled the jian from her belt and jabbed the steel hilt into the younger man's face. He dropped like a stone, clutching his mouth, and spit the teeth that she'd knocked out onto the alley paving. Enough space for a decent swing opened up around them and Alex took full advantage of being able to drive the blunted scabbard into his left kidney.