Finn hadn’t considered the challenges the executioner lived under, though the Lion had been killed.
“What now?” Finn asked.
The executioner looked off into the distance. Finn couldn’t tell what he stared at. More buildings? Another place he had to go for his errands? Whatever it was seemed to draw his attention.
“Now you can rest. You’ve had a long day. Longer than me, I suppose. Can you find your way back to the house?”
Finn nodded. It would be easy enough for him to return to the house. Situated as it was along the river, Finn only had to backtrack through the city until he reached the river, then he could follow that until he came to the house.
“Good. Get some rest. Tomorrow, we start early.”
He started away, heading out along the street.
“What am I supposed to call you?” Finn asked.
The executioner didn’t turn. “Master Meyer.”
Morning came as sunlight streamed in through the window. The window was small, though larger than he’d had in the prison, and without any curtains, it woke him before he was ready to get up. Finn supposed that was the point of it. Wake him and be ready for the day. That was what Master Meyer wanted.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, Finn looked around the room, his gaze lingering on the desk. When he’d come back the night before—ignoring the urge to run and try to disappear into the city—he’d found that he was every bit as tired as Master Meyer had expected him to be. He’d fallen asleep quickly, having not changed out of his clothes, lying on the bed in the dress of the condemned.
What am I doing here?
Those thoughts kept coming back to him. He didn’t know what he was doing. Only that he hadn’t run. Yet. It had to be yet, didn’t it?
The sound of footsteps came from outside the room. Meyer was already up.
Finn imagined that he’d looked in on him whenever he’d come back for the day, likely staring at Finn with a smug expression.
Not smug. I doubt he does smug.
That wasn’t the sense he had from Master Meyer. Finn didn’t yet know why he’d let Finn come with him to stay, but there had to be a reason. Perhaps it was only to thumb his nose at the magister. He did have the sense the executioner hadn’t cared for the sentencing, though not because of anything that Finn had done. It was more about him not caring for it for another reason.
Getting to his feet, he grabbed his slippers from the door and headed out of the room. He needed shoes if he were going to keep traveling through the city with Master Meyer. Other clothes, too.
“You’re up. Good.”
Meyer leaned out into the hallway and glanced in his direction.
How had he known?
“I’m sorry if I overslept. I didn’t mean—”
“Give me a hand in here.”
Finn nodded. It began again. Errands. Whatever task Meyer wanted of him. That was his life now.
But it is life.
Meyer stood in front of a hot stove, the smell of grease and eggs sizzling in the pan almost too much for Finn to bear. His mouth watered at the scent.
It had been a while since he’d eaten well. Longer than his imprisonment.
“What can I do?”
“Can you cook?”
“I have some experience,” he said. “When my mother started getting sick, my sister and I—”
“If you can cook, then you get to take over. I’ve been doing this long enough. Not my favorite task.”
Meyer grabbed a steaming mug and headed away from the stove, taking a seat at the table. Finn hurried over and grabbed the spatula to work at the eggs. Meyer had used a large pan, and six eggs congealed together in the bottom of the pan. Finn started to separate them, working the spatula between the eggs.
“We’re going to begin some of the basics of your instruction today,” Meyer said as Finn worked.
“I thought the basics were yesterday.”
“Yesterday was part of determining whether you were going to run. As you didn’t, I figure that today, we can begin with your instruction. I have only a few days to determine whether you’ll be useful enough for me to make my case to the king.”
Finn tensed. He hadn’t known that yesterday was a test. “What do I have to know to be useful?”
“In the time we have before the king arrives? Not much. You’ll need to prove that you can follow the tasks set before you. Other than that, you need to prove that you’re open to change. Not sure we can accomplish all of that in the time we have, but we’ll try.”
The eggs were getting done at different times. One of them had burned, and Finn scraped at it, trying to get it off the pan.
What had Meyer done with them?
“The next few days will be long. For both of us. With Gerdan’s loss, my responsibilities have increased, especially with all the activity in the city. Until—and if—you become useful, we’re both going to have little sleep. Get used to it.”
Finn pulled the best of the eggs from the pan and slipped them onto a plate, bringing it over to Meyer. The executioner stared at the plate for a moment before looking up at Finn.
“You cook?”
“As I was saying, my sister and I had to learn after my mother got sick.”
Finn looked around the kitchen. It was small but cozy. Dishes stacked near a basin reminded him of the way Lena had left a mess in the kitchen. The executioner likely had easy access to water—gods, he might even have a well of his own in his home—but it didn’t look as if he took care of it any better than Finn’s sister.
“Do you have a wife?”
The executioner looked up briefly in between bites of food. “I did.”
Finn decided not to push on that. Did. That could mean many things in Verendal.
Looking around the kitchen with a different eye, he noticed there were a few decorations. Enough that he suspected Meyer’s wife had once placed them.
“Eat. Then we get started.”
Finn scooped the remaining eggs onto his plate and took a seat at the table. The executioner sat silently while Finn ate. His were burned, though he didn’t complain. At least he had the chance to eat something.
When he was done, Meyer got to his feet and motioned for Finn to follow. Finn set his plate in the basin and followed Meyer. They went down the hall toward the back of the house. Meyer paused at one door along the hall a moment, stepping inside briefly before emerging with a longsword. The leather-wrapped hilt looked well-worn, and the scabbard plain, but Finn recognized the blade.
“Is that—”
“Justice,” the executioner said.
The sword of justice, or Justice, as it seemed the executioner called it, was the means to an honorable death. Not many in the city were offered it these days. Most were sentenced to hang—or worse. Finn hadn’t seen some of the worse punishments the magister and jurors assigned and should be thankful he’d only been sentenced to the rope rather than anything more.
“Do you have an execution this morning?” Back-to-back seemed rushed, even with the way things were going these days, when there had been more executions than usual. Finn didn’t know if he could stomach assisting with an execution so soon—if at all.
“No. You’re going to learn the basics.”
“Of using the sword?”
Meyer grunted. “Of cleaning the sword. You have to know how to keep the steel clean before you learn to use it.”
They headed out into the garden. The sun had just started to clear the neighboring buildings, filling the yard with a bright light. Little warmth came from the sunlight, though enough he didn’t feel cold out there as he would have in the shade.
Meyer took a seat on a small wooden bench along the wall. Finn waited across from him, watching as he rested the scabbard of the sword on the ground in front of him and then unsheathed it.
He rested the sword across his lap. The grip was long enough for two hands, and a silver circle adorned the pommel. The blade was different from most Finn had se
en. Not that thieves generally carried swords, but he’d seen enough to recognize how it was different. Long—nearly up to Finn’s waist, were it to rest on the end—the sword was squared off so that it lacked a point like so many other swords had. It seemed Justice didn’t need to stab someone if it could shear off their head.
Meyer pulled a stack of rags and a bottle out from a satchel resting on the ground. “Like all things in your life, you have to maintain it if you expect it to last. A blade can rust if not cared for. Even one like Justice.”
He ran one of the rags along the gleaming surface.
“The blade should be oiled weekly. It’s probably more than necessary, but if you remember to do it weekly, then you’ve done it often enough. You’ll find the oil inside. I assume you remember the room?” He looked up briefly, long enough to see Finn nod. “When it’s out, additional supplies can be purchased at Tahn’s general store. I prefer his personal blend. More clove oil, I suspect. The scabbard should be oiled once a month. A different oil. Don’t mix them up. I’m partial to lemon oil, though it can be difficult to acquire in some months.”
Meyer dabbed a little oil from the bottle and worked it along the length of the blade. When he was satisfied, he used a clean rag and wiped the excess off.
“Why do you do it?” Finn asked.
“Care for the blade?”
That wasn’t what Finn really wanted to know, but it was a reasonable question. He had many other questions he wanted answers to, but this would be easiest.
“I’ve told you. For it to last, it must be maintained. The blade is old. It’s been with the executioners in this city for several hundred years, so treat it that way.” He looked up, holding Finn’s gaze. “It’s more than that, though. I’ve been given a heavy burden. It’s one I don’t enter into lightly. The gods chose me to wield the sword of justice, so I must do so wisely. A clean blow to send those so sentenced to the afterlife.”
Finn found it strange that Meyer would be so seemingly religious. How could he hold on to his faith with the horror he had to inflict?
Perhaps it was nothing more than an act.
If so, it seemed strange to Finn that he would keep it up for him.
“Do you think you can manage?” Master Meyer asked.
Finn nodded.
“Good. This will be part of your responsibilities. Once a week. When you prove you can maintain the blade, we’ll begin to teach you to use it.”
“Isn’t it just swinging it?”
Meyer looked up, intensity in his gaze. “Have you not been listening?”
“I’ve listened—”
“The gods chose me. Now us. We must honor them by cutting cleanly. Not hacking. We aren’t butchers. We’re better than that.”
He turned his attention back to the sword, steadily running the rag along the surface of it.
Finn could only stand and stare.
Better than a butcher? What would Lena say to that?
At least the butcher provided food for others to eat. To Finn, that was more honorable than this. There was a time when he wouldn’t have thought that way, but now he began to wonder if he’d ever be honorable again.
Chapter Eleven
The days leading up to the king’s visit left Finn feeling more anxious than he would have expected. He hadn’t anticipated that he’d feel a growing sense of unease about his fate the longer he spent with Master Meyer, but that was exactly what he felt.
He’d debated going to the crew but held off. For now. He didn’t know what would happen if he were to slip off, and it seemed better to bide his time.
He would go back to them, though.
The second day with Meyer involved various types of knots. The executioner had given him a length of rope and demonstrated tying them. There were different kinds of nooses, something Finn had never known.
“Tie it like this,” he said, looping it around and slipping the end up and through, “and the knot pulls tight more slowly. It suffocates the condemned.” He untied it and then looped it again. “Like this, and the neck snaps as long as you drop from the right height. A quick death. There are others, but these are how you should start.”
Finn took the rope and practiced much of the day, tying and untying, working until his fingers felt as if they were bleeding, though they didn’t. He still felt as if there would be a way to run, but he hadn’t taken it yet.
The third day, they traveled along the massive wall surrounding the city, near enough that Finn could see the Archers manning it every couple dozen paces, and he wondered if he might be able to slip past. There were several gates through the wall, so more than one way in and out of the city. He wouldn’t have to head past the Raven Stone on the way out, though it might be the easiest. Finn didn’t know if the Raven Stone were watched as closely as the other gates.
Every time he thought about running, he would look over to Master Meyer, and he’d realize that he couldn’t. The executioner had given him a warning about what would happen were he to run, and he believed the Archers would be watching for him. That was probably the reason the executioner hadn’t given him anything different to wear than the grays he was supposed to have been executed in. It would make it easier on the Archers to search for someone wearing grays like that. He doubted he’d be able to easily slip through the gate.
Not that he couldn’t find a way to steal something different. Finn had been observing the shops near the executioner’s home to see what he might be able to find and whether there would be anyplace he could use to uncover anything useful for him to escape. One place might have been useful, though it was too close to Master Meyer’s home. Close enough that Finn didn’t want to risk it. Yet.
“Where are we going today?” Finn asked. He’d gotten used to the patrols. Most of them involved the executioner leading him around the city.
“I think it’s time to bring you into the prison visits.”
“You do?”
Meyer looked back at him. “Seeing as how you haven’t run, I think it’s time to give you a chance to determine whether you might be useful. There won’t be anything too exotic today, but perhaps you’ll find something intriguing about it.”
“Is this what your last apprentice did?” Finn hadn’t heard Meyer talk about the Lion that much.
“Assistant. He was not truly my apprentice. He was a journeyman before he came to me.”
Finn wasn’t sure what that meant, but Meyer didn’t seem eager to explain. “You’ve looked into what happened to him?”
“Yes, but I have done this long enough to know when a truth does not want to come out. That happens often enough these days. Now with the king’s visit, I doubt I’ll find anything.”
“Why would you say that?”
Meyer glanced over to him. “He was investigating your case; it’s entirely possible one of your friends murdered him.”
That didn’t sound like his crew. They were thieves, not killers. Besides, why murder the Lion and not rescue Finn?
“Doesn’t that seem like an answer that wants to come out?”
“His death offered you this opportunity, so perhaps you’re better off if it does not.”
As they headed toward a familiar prison in the distance, Finn pushed away the thought of Oscar visiting him in prison.
He couldn’t have killed the Lion, could he?
This was a section of the city Finn knew all too well. “The debtor’s prison?”
“You don’t think this will be interesting?”
“I just don’t think the people you have captive here are all that worthy of captivity.”
“Many of them owe a significant debt.”
“I’m sure the gods are so disappointed in them,” Finn muttered as he shook his head. “You don’t seem to care that there are those who have much and don’t care about those who have nothing.”
“I care. I also understand my role.”
Was that what Finn would have to do as well? He didn’t know if he’d be able to have the
same view as Master Meyer.
“How do you do it?”
“I serve the crown.”
Finn shook his head. “Not that. How do you do things when you disagree with them?” When Master Meyer didn’t answer and continued heading toward the debtor’s prison, he decided to push. “I had a feeling that you weren’t pleased with my punishment.”
“I don’t serve in that capacity.”
“You intervened,” Finn said.
The executioner’s back stiffened. “I did what the gods would have wanted me to do.”
“Because you think I can serve the gods.”
“All men can serve the gods.”
“I didn’t deserve the sentencing they handed down. You didn’t think so either.”
Master Meyer didn’t say anything.
They reached the walkway leading into the prison. Meyer unlocked it with a key from a massive keyring. Finn could imagine Master Meyer as having access to the different prisons all throughout the city—and perhaps he did. To do the job he had, he’d have to be able to get into the prisons, torment the prisoners, and then…
“What do you have to do here?” Finn asked softly.
Meyer looked over at him. “Not all here are as innocent as you’d like to believe.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“And not all here are for the crime of owing the wealthy.”
He didn’t give Finn the chance to ask more about what he meant.
They stepped into the prison.
Finn had been in Volthan Prison, in addition to Declan. He’d laughed and gossiped and basically waited for his sentencing, knowing that it would be unpleasant but that there wouldn’t be anything more that he’d need to worry about. Declan was hard—harder than he ever would have expected before he’d been sentenced. He couldn’t imagine what it would be like, were he to be there for weeks. Months. Even years. Volthan had been almost a community of thieves.
The debtor’s prison felt like neither.
Finn hadn’t realized how many windows lined the walls. From outside, it was difficult to tell, but inside, sunlight streamed down through those windows, illuminating not only the hallway but the walls themselves.
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