Steel Victory (Steel Empire Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page A

him her sword and he ducked out of the shelter to settle against another nearby tree.
    She curled up next to Asaron, entwining her fingers with his. Asaron completed her family, and with them, Limani could stand up to anything.

    Toria closed her eyes in brief dismay when thunder rolled through the apartment. That wasn’t supposed to happen. When the glassware in her impromptu laboratory stopped rattling on its shelves, she peered at the beaker and dagger in her hands. The silver solution coating the bottom and sides of the beaker had transformed into a black chalky substance. The blade didn’t look much better. Useless, now. She plunked both items back on the counter and pulled off her lab glasses.
    “What the hell?”
    At her partner’s query, the containment spell collapsed around her in sparkles of violet light. When the last vestiges faded, Toria waved her glasses at the doorway. “Hey.”
    Kane stepped into her lab—also known as the corner kitchen of their apartment—with an over-exaggerated hesitant expression. “Am I in danger of being blown up?”
    “Not today,” Toria said. She eyed the charred mark on the countertop. Yet another sample had proven a failure. She exchanged her glasses for the beaker and crossed to the other counter, making sure not to scuff the chalk lines on the tile floor with her feet.
    Kane stayed well away from her work area, choosing a stool from the sitting area of their open-concept apartment. “What happened to ‘I will not set things on fire without my partner present’?”
    Toria washed and rinsed the beaker, then brought a damp sponge back to the other counter to dab at the black soot mark. “You had plans. With a boy. So this is me entertaining myself while you’re out on hot dates.” Some hard scrubbing removed most of the mark.
    “You could have gone with Mikelos and Victory last night and stayed back at the house. Mikelos would have cooked for you this morning,” Kane said.
    “But then the whole sword thing would have come up,” Toria said. “It’s embarrassing.” Not only had she broken her sword and had to ask her grandfather to get it repaired, but the sword had been an antique that used to belong to one of Victory’s progeny. She wasn’t looking forward to her mother finding out. “So. Your date. Any good?”
    “He was okay,” Kane said, running a hand through his close-cropped black hair. “Really, really old-country British, so he freaked out when he figured out I was Victory’s foster son. In the middle of brunch. Also embarrassing.”
    “Sorry, hon,” Toria said. She was, honest. Her partner was tall, dark, and drop-dead gorgeous. And still got more dates than she did, even considering his more limited dating pool. In a perfect world, she and Kane would have lived happily ever after together, but their relationship had been closer to that of siblings from day one. But no time to dwell, she had work to do. “The day is still young. Want to help?”
    Kane left his safe spot to come closer to her workspace, dragging the stool behind him. She knew he wouldn’t be able to resist her latest chemistry project, even if he was often limited to note-taker and general observer. Still more interesting than hoity-toity British boys. “What are you up to now?” He eyed her neat row of vials containing different variations on the silver goop she’d just discarded.
    “Well, I figured out why my sword broke,” Toria said. “Simple, in the end, and I should have realized it a long time ago.” Any middle-school kid with a chemistry set knew the answer to that one. Or hobbyist jeweler. Or self-taught metallurgist. All of which she was, to one degree or another. “Why is silver mixed with copper in most jewelry?”
    “Umm . . .”
    He did this, acted the dunce to make her feel better. She loved him for it. “It’s mixed with copper to make the piece stronger. Silver on its own is too soft a metal to retain its shape against hard wear and tear,” she