Which turned out to be a very nice way to end the day.
It was not, however, the end of the entire incident.
“I don’t understand why we all have to go,” Lee complained, running a comb very carefully through his hair to be sure the part was perfect. “I wasn’t even there!”
All five of the dorm-mates were lined up in front of the bathing-room mirrors, preparing for Nanna Mabbina’s inspection prior to this suddenly-required outing.
Pol said, “Oh, you know Mabbina. She isn’t happy unless she’s making all the rest of us miserable.”
Michael was excited. He’d not been away from JhaPel since his arrival. Holy Prayers didn’t count since the temple was only across the square. The point of the outing had been kept secret, but everyone in their age group—boys and girls—had to go. A nanna was assigned to each dorm, and there was a rumor going around that they’d all get some sort of treat afterwards, too.
The other boys were each doing their best to be the most cynical of the group about this outing, but Michael could feel their excitement and knew they were all pretending. He decided not to play that game and didn’t hide his own enthusiasm.
The weather was typical, but the rain had dwindled down to sprinkles when they trooped out through JhaPel’s front gate at last. Mabbina escorted their group, a circumstance which Michael tried not to let dampen his excitement.
“At least no one got Tierna,” Pol muttered to him.
“You may speak,” Nanna Mabbina said with incongruous patience. “This is a holiday, after all. I shan’t box your ears for enjoying yourselves. Just don’t run wild.”
Michael grinned at Pol who turned around to walk backwards and face him as he spoke. His arms waved more wildly, and all the boys grouped together, breaking their disciplined single-file to better hear Pol.
“I got a letter from my uncle who’s off in the fighting,” Pol continued a bit more loudly. Other groups nearby began to drift closer to listen. “He said there’s a bad fever in the fleet, so things aren’t going very well—”
“This is true,” Mabbina agreed. “We must all say our prayers diligently that Vail protect our valiant fighting men who do so much to protect us.”
Michael knew almost nothing of the war, but he nodded and mumbled agreement along with all the other children. He wanted to ask what the war was about and why they had to fight and who they were fighting and a dozen other questions, but he did not want to have Mabbina’s attention focused on him, so he didn’t say anything.
“Yeah,” Pol continued. “And a lot of ‘em are coming back and at Landsend. With Nanna Tierna.”
“I hope she doesn’t get sick!” Jiin looked horrified at the prospect.
“They are very careful at the hospital,” Mabbina said. “Do not worry.”
But she’s worried, Michael thought. Maybe that’s why she’s being so nice.
“Are we going to get sick, Nanna?” Ned asked, voicing the very question Michael wanted answered.
She hesitated and turned, giving them the least-convincing smile Michael had ever seen. “We are in no danger from the fever, children. The queen and the Duke of Reyahl are doing everything necessary to protect us.”
This seemed meant to shut them up on the matter, and everyone took the cue and started talking about other things amongst themselves. They walked on through the twisting streets, and Michael looked all around, trying to figure out the pattern. He couldn’t really see one.
“It’s all twisty,” he said to Pol.
“You can get lost in tics, Uncle Harly always says,” Pol agreed and was about to say something else when Mabbina stopped and called for everyone’s attention.
She gave a short, snappish speech about being respectful and quiet and paying attention and not shaming JhaPel. Then her voice filled with an excitement Michael hadn’t thought she was capable of feeling.
“You are about to witness a most holy event, children. This is Vail’s justice for all those who stray from her path!”
Mabbina led them forward once more, and, as they trooped around the final bend in the street, they arrived above a large, open area filled to capacity with people. In the center of this area stood a great stone arch, intricately carved and looking like a gateway to nowhere. Beyond this lay the harbor, filled with boats arriving and leaving, people moving to and from busily along the docks, and all behaving as if whatever was going on around this arch meant nothing to them.
“It’s a pyre!” someone from another group shouted, enthusiastic.
Michael frowned, turning to look toward the voice, but he turned back when he felt Pol’s hand grab his arm. His fingers squeezed hard, almost hurting, and Michael could feel his friend’s terror.
“Pol, are you all right?” Michael gasped. Pol afraid did not fit into his world. Pol was never afraid of anything.
“This is a burning, Michael,” Pol choked. “This is an execution.”
Michael followed Pol’s terrorized stare and saw at last the mountain of cut brush piled in front of the arch. A stone pillar stuck out of the center of the pile with chains hanging off of it, awaiting a victim.
The rest of the event unfolded like a nightmare as they began moving forward again. Mabbina herded them all much closer to the pyre to an area apparently reserved for them. Most of the children seemed excited by the prospect of seeing an actual execution, but Pol was nearly sick with fear and horror, his feelings echoing through Michael’s body.
Michael was afraid, too, but the idea of seeing anyone suffer anything always upset him. Pol hadn’t let go of his arm, and Michael at last gave into temptation and reached out to see if he could discover why Pol was so afraid.
Flashes from Pol’s memory ran through his mind, oddly mingling terror and happiness. A lovely, smiling face with the same soft brown skin and curly hair as Pol’s. His mother. The memory of another pyre followed, this time already in flames, the heat roiling off it and burning small, helpless hands reaching toward that lovely face—
Michael shuddered hard and swallowed a gasp of utter horror. His mother was burned! Mabbina should never have made him come. But it was like her to do it, to rub Pol’s face in his mother’s heretical death. He didn’t like to hate anyone—even Telyr—but it was hard not to hate Mabbina right at that moment.
The crowd roared suddenly, and all of them turned to see what had caused the sound. People in rich, formal dress were walking out across the platform upon which the arch stood, putting them above the crowd and the pyre.
“The queen!” Ned clapped his hands excitedly. The whole group of orphans joined him, and the crowd’s cheers swelled as well, but Pol stayed still. Michael, uncertain, followed Pol. He didn’t want to pull his arm away to clap, anyway. Pol seemed to need the physical contact to keep from falling apart.
Mabbina’s baleful eye fell upon them, and Michael swallowed hard. “Pol isn’t feeling well, Nanna,” he said. “I think the crowd is making it worse.” It certainly was for him. “May I take him—?”
“No,” she snapped, but she seemed more irritated than anything else. “Just mind him. It’s too chaotic to leave now, and you’ll only get lost in any case.” She looked directly at Michael, her frown deepening, and added, “Besides, you need to see this most of all.”
This caught Pol’s attention at last, and he turned a savage glare on the woman who took an involuntary step back.
“Behave,” she said after a hesitation, then she turned away and stared determinedly toward the platform.
A man stepped forward, away from the rest of the highborns, and began to speak. His voice carried over the crowd as if he were used to addressing throngs.
“That’s the Duke of Reyahl,” Jiin breathed, deeply impressed, and Michael could see why. The queen’s nephew commanded the entire military and, most said, all but ran the country himself. Most people were more afraid of his power than the queen’s, and, if the tales were true, with good reason. No one ever defeated the duke.
As the d
uke spoke, an older man was led out, chains binding his arms and legs. The guards shoved and dragged him to the post, but he didn’t seem to have the strength to help or hinder them. He leaned against the post almost as if he were happy to have it there to support him. He’d been cleaned up, but Michael was close enough to see he’d been beaten, probably more than once.
He couldn’t take his eyes off the man who was so soon to die so horribly. He thought he would have been much more afraid—crying or fighting the chains or something—but this man seemed resigned. Or maybe he’s too bad off to realize what’s happening.
The jailors retreated, closing the gap in the brush which had allowed them to reach the pillar, and the executioner stepped forward, holding aloft a torch. Michael hadn’t heard a word the duke had said up to now, too focused on the victim, but he heard the last words as sentence was pronounced.
“...mercy of Vail, this man shall be executed by fire. May the fire purify his soul of all evil so that Vail Herself will welcome him into Her Country.”
And with that, the executioner lowered the torch and lit the brush. Slowly, he walked the circumference of the pyre, lighting the brush at regular intervals, until the convicted man was hidden behind a wall of fire. The sweet smell of burning brush jarred against Michael’s understanding of what was to follow.
The fire started well away from the victim, and this seemed to Michael impossibly cruel—as if killing someone this way isn’t cruel enough already!
How can Vail be loving or kind if She wants people to die like this? He knew this thought probably was very heretical, but he didn’t care. He’s going to burn anyway—why does he have to watch and wait for the fire to reach him? Why couldn’t they set fire to his clothes and get it over with as quickly as possible?
That would be some sort of mercy...compared to this.
Pol stood beside him, still clutching his arm. His friend shook with fear and rage combined so thoroughly they made a single, indelible emotion.
Michael could barely breathe. He and Pol were locked into their own experience of the execution while everyone around them seemed to be enjoying it—cheering and throwing things into the fire to watch them burn up.
I can’t be sick, can’t be weak, have to be strong for Pol.
But when the fire reached its victim at last, Michael couldn’t block out the agony radiating from the man, hotter than the fire itself. He bit down hard, locking his jaw to keep from screaming, and tasted blood. Pol’s fingers squeezed bruises into his arm as the man’s screams sounded over the roar of the crowd and noise of the fire. The thick, choking odor of burning flesh filled his nose and mouth and throat, and he wanted to vomit.
Through it all, Michael saw Mabbina watching him, and a fleeting prayer ran through his mind just before the man’s death hit him. Somehow, he managed not to faint or scream or do anything to give himself away. He still wanted to be sick, but Pol beat him to that, and he thanked Vail for the distraction tending his friend gave him. This distracted Mabbina, too, who seemed to fear not some telltale sign of heresy in her charge but that he may have, after all, contracted some illness.
They were all hurried back to the orphanage, thoughts of the promised treat forgotten, and Michael hoped the distraction would make her also forget his own behavior.
Staring out his window much later that night, Cyra cuddled comfortingly in his lap, he admitted to himself that he was probably not going to be that lucky. She already suspected before we even left JhaPel. She already thinks I’m bad.
Memories of the pyre ran through his mind, and he shuddered again, sick with fear, and knew he would do anything to avoid meeting such a fate.
# # #
CHAPTER SEVEN
Jarlyth Denara stood in the corridor outside the royal courtroom, unable to endure witnessing what was going on inside its walls.
It had taken almost two years, but he and the small band of soldiers he had gathered to his cause as a sort of “prince’s guard” had finally run to ground the remnant of the mercenary gang responsible for the abduction of Prince Nylan and his own near-murder that horrible morning.
They claimed to have been ripped apart and tortured by the Voyavel Curse—a further, silent witness to their guilt—and though a mere handful survived to tell the tale, they seemed almost relieved to have been captured at last.
They’d told Jarlyth blood-chilling tales of mischance, mayhem, and disaster steadily winnowing their numbers, and all seemed sure the curse was to blame. The highest-ranking survivor swore as much to any who would listen.
“The captain said the prince’d called down the curse. Chlena’s fault—if he’d not touched the boy, like we could’a dropped him an’ run afore he thought to damn us.”
Seeing as how they’d dared do anything at all to the boy he’d raised since birth, Jarlyth had no pity to spare them. He’d heard all their vile tales and excuses before anyone else had learned about the monstrous things they’d done to the prince. He couldn’t stand to hear them admit those atrocities again.
Beside him, dressed in her Templar apprentice’s garb, stood the ever-faithful Flannery Llorka. Fifteen years old but as steady and brave as any of his veterans—and she’d never wavered in her support. But she was there when he was born, too. Maybe that makes a difference—to have seen that moment.
In spite of the fact that, as the prince’s warder, Jarlyth had a mystical, goddess-blessed connection to Nylan which enabled him to know as surely as he knew anything that the boy was still alive, nearly everyone believed Nylan was dead. They believed Jarlyth’s surety came from guilt over his failure to save the boy. Even those who had helped Jarlyth on his “mad” quest didn’t really believe the prince was alive; they simply believed such a crime could not go unpunished.
Even Mother and Father look at me with pity. But Flannery believed, and she stood beside him, keeping him company now. He was glad to have her there. It was tiring being constantly surrounded by those who looked on him as a foolish, broken man, lost in denial.
“Milord?” Flannery said, her voice hesitant and worried. “Jary?”
“Yes?” His voice was toneless, but he looked up to meet her eyes.
“They’re calling for you, Jary.” She pointed down the corridor toward the massive door that now stood half-open. Evander Mercatia—one of the “prince’s guard”—was peering around the door at him, waiting while Flannery redirected his attention. He nodded his thanks to her and went to Evander.
“The king requests you return to the courtroom, milord,” the man said. “I’m sorry.” The last he said in a low voice, and Jarlyth almost smiled. Evander knew.
It had taken Jarlyth far too many precious moons to recover from his long death-sleep. He’d had to rebuild atrophied muscles and learn to walk all over again. Then more time had been wasted as he’d had to retrain his body in the martial skills he’d once thought were written into his bones. All the days and moons lost that he could not afford to lose. So much time passing while Nylan awaited a rescue that failed to come.
Evander had served Jarlyth as loyally as any of them, chasing down every fruitless lead until, at last...
And now here they were.
“Have they finished?” Jarlyth asked, though it didn’t matter if they had. He couldn’t disobey a royal request.
“Yes, milord. They’re finished.” Jarlyth guessed Evander hadn’t used that last word without intending its double meaning.
So, it will be a hanging after all. Or perhaps something much more gruesome? Jarlyth had wanted this end from the moment he’d known Nylan was gone, but now he didn’t see what the point of such a thing could be.
“Milord?” Evander prompted. Jarlyth inhaled and straightened up to a more soldierly posture then blew out his breath and nodded for Evander to lead on.
#
Michael had read about the world changing overnight, and sometimes adults would say something similar about some great event—usually in regard to the war in general or referring to some
bloody battle just written-up in the Sentinel—but he’d never really thought about what such a phrase meant.
It was not, after all, overnight that his world changed, though it was very fast, indeed. It snuck up on him, bit by bit, until the last few changes that completely altered his life seemed to occur all at once. Overnight.
He didn’t know how to accept so much change, but he tried not to show how much it upset him, and he made certain to hide his anger and resentment. None of that would do him any good. The world had changed, after all. His world had changed. There didn’t seem to be any way to go back to what it had been before.
Michael sensed Pol’s approach but didn’t turn his attention toward his friend’s arrival. Since the pyre, he’d become even more careful not to do anything out of the ordinary.
When Pol drew near enough for a normal person to have noticed, Michael smiled at him. He straightened up from where he’d been scrubbing the entrance hall’s enormous tiled floor and dropped his brush into the bucket for a moment.
“I’ve almost finished,” he said, a little out-of-breath. “Is it time for evening meal already?”
Pol had come to a stop a little distance from him and shifted from foot to foot, nervous about something. “Not yet. I have something to tell you, and it couldn’t wait.”
It took Michael a moment to stand up, so cramped were his legs from kneeling on the wet, cold floor for hours. His shoulders ached, and his hand felt stuck in its scrubbing shape. But he shook the loose strands of his long, black hair out of his face, his smile fading a bit as he looked up at his friend. Even when he stood up, the top of his head just reached Pol’s chin.
“What’s happened? You’re all...I don’t know. Funny.”
“And you have a smudge on your nose,” Pol retorted.
SanClare Black (The Prince of Sorrows) Page 10