by Katy Haye
He glanced around his dim cell and his lips twisted. He’d be out in the daylight, at last, able to turn his face to the sky. He had to hope the gods still had plans for him.
23 – The King will Deal with Her
The stalls in the marketplace had been pushed to the edges of city square, leaving plenty of room for the scaffold erected in the middle of the space, between the fountain and the palace gates. From under my hood, I glanced up at the balcony where the royal family would stand to watch the execution. It was empty now.
The palace looked peaceful. A lump rose in my throat. They had to know I was missing, but I couldn’t detect any activity to track me down. Guards stood either side of the gates, and the gardens within were still and calm.
I turned away. I didn’t need to know what was going on in the palace. I needed to focus on the scaffold.
That was already thronged about with people who were determined to get a good view of proceedings. I shuddered. I’d never been able to bear watching executions, and it was ten times worse now that Lyo was the condemned. How could people look forward to someone being abruptly and violently deprived of their life? It was barbaric.
There was no sign of the executioner. He’d arrive as the clock struck midday. I did notice our first problem, though. I hadn’t tried to mislead Kiri and Pell. Usually, there were only two guards assigned to an execution. It seemed that the execution of a foreigner found breaking into the palace had a notoriety that drew trouble, or that’s what my father was expecting. Today, there were six guards posted at the corners and along the front edge of the scaffold, staring impassively out at the crowd.
Kiri swore under her breath.
“Stay calm,” Pell counselled her. “We can still do it.” He touched my shoulder. “You can play your part?” he whispered.
“Yes. I’m ready.” I tugged at the hood of my cloak. I was more than happy to pull it back and declare myself when it could help Lyo, but I didn’t want to be unmasked before then.
“Okay, go somewhere quiet until it all starts.”
It was sound advice when the crowd was so restive. I wriggled my way out of the throng and wandered around the stalls that edged the square, keeping my head down and moving on any time a stallholder tried to engage me in conversation.
My palms were sweating. We’d come early deliberately so we could scope out the area before anything happened, but now I just wanted it all to be over. My mind kept running through all the ways that our plan could fail.
Strong, I told myself. I was strong enough to get here; nothing would stop me now. I took a deep breath and forced myself to continue circling the marketplace as time crept by.
The clock striking midday took me by surprise, sending a thrill of alarm through me. The bells pealed, then twelve chimes reverberated through city square. As the last one faded away, the executioner strode onto the scaffold, the axe over his shoulder catching the sun with a glint of silver. The crowd sighed, half-anticipation, half-despair. The hairs on the back of my neck rose, my gaze fixated on the polished blade. I couldn’t let him use that axe.
I glanced at the palace, but the balcony was deserted. My father had as strong a sense of theatre as the executioner. He’d be the last to arrive, making a grand entrance to ensure all eyes were on him.
Orders were shouted to the guards and movement began in the square. The crowd hushed. Guards pushed through, forming a column between the palace gates and the scaffold. I could see where they drew apart to let the prisoner through, but I wasn’t tall enough to see Lyo himself. While everyone was looking in that direction, I pushed between the crowd, wriggling around elbows and ducking under armpits until I was right in front of the scaffold, eye-to-eye with one of the guards.
The executioner stood in front of me. He was dressed head-to-toe in black, as was the custom. I shivered. His face was covered with a hood with holes cut for his eyes. The only bare part of him were the hands wrapped around the axe whose head rested between his black-shod feet.
My brain lurched into imaginations. Wasn’t he going to end up with blood on his hands? Wouldn’t the gory liquid make his hands slip?
I nearly threw up, wrenching my head away so I couldn’t see him any longer. Lyo. That was Lyo’s blood I was imagining on his hands, and that wasn’t going to happen. We couldn’t let it happen.
Jeers broke out from the crowd. In looking away I’d missed the moment when Lyo stepped onto the scaffold. This close, his skin looked grey, his hair tousled and dirty-looking. His hands were bound with rope. Of more concern was that his legs were also shackled, a chain hobbling him. He could walk – or shuffle – but he’d be hard-pressed to run. I shifted, peering through the crowd until I caught Pell’s eye. He gave a nod. He’d seen the problem, so I had to trust he could deal with it.
The guard who accompanied Lyo onto the scaffold shoved him to his knees on the boards beside the block set in the middle of the space. The rope that tied his hands together was pulled over the block and fastened to a hook on its far side. Lyo’s hands were stretched over its wooden top, ready for the first stage of his punishment.
The captain turned to the crowd, hands raised for silence. The noise didn’t lessen by much, so he simply raised his voice. “This criminal has been found guilty of theft and treason. For theft, his hands will be forfeit.”
The crowd bayed. I fought the urge to throw up again.
The captain waited calmly for the noise to abate. I shifted until I could see Pell again. His gaze was steady. Not yet.
“For treason,” the captain continued when he thought he could be heard, “his life is forfeit. His head will be struck from his shoulders. His remains will then be burned, as a warning to all that criminal behaviour will not be tolerated in Muirland.”
He paused and glanced towards the palace. The balcony was occupied now, Father, Mother and Jaran clear to see. I wondered if anyone in the crowd noticed or cared that the princess was missing. The captain waited. I returned my attention to Lyo. I thought he had spotted Pell, his gaze burning into the crowd on that side of the platform. Good. He knew help was here.
“Go ahead,” the king called, his voice carrying loud into the square, where the catcalls and chatter finally silenced.
The executioner hefted his axe and took a step toward the block as the captain stepped back, his job done.
And the crowd exploded into noise again, yelling for blood and death and revenge for suffering they hadn’t experienced.
“Wait! Stop!” I struggled towards the platform, reaching for the guard, but the crowd pushed me back. Everyone was straining forward, desperate not to miss anything. “Stop!”
The executioner kept moving, taking his place beside the condemned man. My heart clenched painfully. The crowd was making such a racket he couldn’t even hear me.
I turned to the face beside me in the crowd. I had no idea who he was, a stranger baying for the blood of a boy he didn’t know, who’d done him no harm. I grabbed his arm, squeezing until I got his attention. “I need to get on the scaffold,” I told him. “Help me up.”
He stared at me stupidly. “You want to die?”
No! The executioner settled his hands around the handle and lifted his axe slowly, the blade glinting in the sunlight. I pushed past the stupid man and came face to face again with the guard whose job it was to keep everyone away from the carnage. As I stepped forward he tried to push me back, but sudden pressure behind me boosted me up. I grabbed hold of the guard and pulled myself onto his shoulders, turning in time to see Pell before he vanished back into the crowd.
I clambered forward onto the scaffold and got to my feet. The captain who’d tied Lyo to the block stepped towards me, hands out. “Get back,” he ordered.
I threw back my hood. “I am the Princess Jurelle and I command you to stop this execution.”
His eyes widened. My attention was drawn past him to the executioner, and Lyo, tied to the block, awaiting his fate. Axe high, the executioner glanced at the balcony. I didn’t have to
follow his gaze to know that my father had nodded his permission for the executioner to go ahead. The man’s bare hands shifted, his fingers resettling on the handle so his grip was steady. I was out of time!
“Stop!” I lurched forward, grabbing the executioner, pushing him back with both hands. We staggered to a halt, the axe dropping to the ground, although his hands remained tight on the handle.
The executioner shifted, uncertain. My eyes dredged the crowd at the side of the platform. There. Pell had knocked a guard to the ground and was clambering onto the platform.
“No Surran blood will be spilled here today!” I declared.
Pell was halfway across the scaffold, fighting with the guard captain. The executioner blinked at me, then looked to the palace balcony for instructions.
I dashed to the block, reaching for the knots that kept Lyo tethered to it. A moment later, his hands were free of the block, although still tied together. He pushed on the block to get to his feet.
Screams rose around me. I’d thought of the guards as being the only danger to Lyo’s escape. It hadn’t occurred to me how the crowd might react. I’d told Kiri that people watched the executions because they were expected to. But many of them enjoyed the entertainment. And they were furious to have it interrupted.
Someone clawed for me, snatching a corner of my cloak. They pulled me and I fell back. I tugged back and others joined in, fighting a tug of war to pull me off the scaffold. “Get out of the way! We can’t see.”
Farther into the crowd a chant had started: “Kill him, kill him!”
I was dragged towards the edge of the platform, struggling with the button at my throat. I managed to unfasten it a moment before I’d have been dragged into the baying crowd. A glance showed me that Pell had been tackled to the floor of the platform by two guards, while Lyo was trying to complete the job of removing the ropes that bound him while chaos reigned. On the other side of the scaffold, Kiri was struggling to reach her brother, her expression dark with fury.
“Get on with it!” My father’s bellowed command reached us even over the clamour of the crowd. The guard I’d used to help me reach the scaffold grabbed hold of me, pinning my arms to my sides. He tried to walk me to the side of the platform, but I struggled and kicked.
“No! Stop this! I am the princess!”
Kiri was also struggling, half-on and half-off the platform. She was in the grip of two people: a guard on the scaffold who had hold of her arms, while a burly man in the crowd held her legs as she bucked like a madwoman to be free.
“Get on with it!” Father repeated.
I twisted to see that another guard had reached Lyo. He pulled on the ends of the rope, dragging a fighting Lyo back towards the block. The executioner raised his axe, ready to strike the moment Lyo’s flesh met the wood.
“No!” We couldn’t fail. But the three of us were trapped by guards, while Lyo was about to lose at least a few fingers, if not his entire hands.
A sharp cry sounded overhead and a dark shape crossed the sun. I wasn’t the only one to have thrown off my disguise. The dragonette swooped towards Lyo, making the guards duck. She gripped the axe in her talons and dragged it from the executioner’s stretching grip, half-lifting him off the platform until he let go. She flapped her wings, circled the platform and dropped the axe into the crowd. Screams broke out as the crowd realised the condemned wasn’t the only person in danger.
Pell used the distraction to kick one of his guards and punch the other. The dragonette returned, diving for the guard holding Kiri. He dropped her to shield his face, stumbling backwards until he fell off the scaffold into the crowd. Kiri landed flat on her back, but she didn’t even pause, sitting up to punch the face of the man holding her legs until he let go. He blinked stupidly, then fell backwards, leaning against a crowd that was too thickly packed to allow him to fall to the ground.
I was still struggling against the guard holding me, but he was determined, and I couldn’t seem to land a decent kick on him.
Kiri sprinted to her brother and tore away his rope bindings. The dragonette attacked the executioner next, forcing him to drop to his knees, huddled over to protect himself. Lyo got to his feet and Kiri helped him stumble to where Pell had now despatched his other guard. The crowd was screaming and half of them seemed to have started fighting amongst themselves.
“Jurelle!” Pell cried. I could barely hear him over the noise of the crowd, but I saw his lips move as he faced me, his hand waving me towards the three of them. “Come on!” He turned, lifting Lyo’s arm over his shoulder so he could half-carry him off the scaffold.
This was it. My time to transform. As a cat I’d slip through the guard’s arms and scamper across the platform to join my new friends.
Except I couldn’t do it. I closed my eyes and the roar of sound burst over me. The guard’s arms were tight around me. My magic was relatively new, and I’d never tried to use it in a situation as chaotic as this. My heart burst with fear. I had to go with them. I couldn’t be caught here. Father might kill me this time. I closed my eyes and tried again but there wasn’t a trace of magic to be found inside me. Magic, it seemed, needed calm, and I had none.
I opened my eyes. The last sight I had of Lyo was of him vanishing into the crowd on the far side of the scaffold. Pell and Kiri were either side of him. They had eyes only for their destination, but Lyo glanced back, his eyes wide as he realised I wasn’t going to make it.
Then the guard wrenched me around so I couldn’t see them anymore. Another of my father’s guards came running, lifting my legs so I was trapped like Kiri had been. I bucked and thrashed, but they were stronger than me. They carried me off the platform and through the crowd, which parted as though they didn’t dare get close to the wild princess.
Tears streaked my face as I screamed and struggled, but nothing could prevent the inevitable. I was carried across city square and through the palace gates that were opened especially for me. My father wasn’t there to greet me. Instead, the steward’s impassive face slid into view. “Lock her in one of the cells. The king will deal with her himself.”
24 – You Found Her
I woke in pain. That was getting too much of a habit. I was lying on something hard and spectacularly uncomfortable. I shifted, lifting a hand to push a strand of straw from my face where it was trying to climb up my nostril. Hard floor, straw, darkness. Memory returned. I was in a cell.
The day’s events came back to me. Lyo was free. I hugged that truth to me. He had got away. Although I might be given his place on the executioner’s block. No, Father probably wouldn’t kill me. He would just make me wish I were dead.
I sat up. My hands ached. I touched them and found my knuckles sore and ragged. I remembered trying to punch the guards who had carried me into the cell. I must have landed more blows than I remembered.
The cell remained dark, even now I was fully awake. A seam of light around the door was the only illumination. I was starving hungry. I debated banging against the door to summon a guard, then decided to wait. I wasn’t in a hurry to meet my fate, and I doubted it would bring breakfast. Hungry or not, it was better to wait until Father had calmed down. I swallowed. It would take a while for him to calm down from being made a fool of in front of the city. That wasn’t what I’d meant to do, but I knew that was how he’d interpret matters.
I scratched my head, finding more straw tangled in my hair. I sneezed.
And a key turned in the lock of the door.
My heartrate spiked. I scrambled back away from danger and faced the doorway.
I hadn’t thought my father would be there himself, but I’d expected to come face to face with one of the guards.
Instead, my brother was standing outside when the door swung open.
“Sis.” He stepped inside, offering me his hand.
I blinked in the sudden light and accepted, struggling to my feet, brushing straw off my clothes. The skin on my knuckles was broken, blood dried brown on my skin. I hoped the gu
ards felt as bad as I did. “Jaran,” I said cautiously.
He shook his head. “You have hidden depths, sis. I never would’ve expected you to stand up to our father like that.” He shifted. I looked past him, surprised to see no guards behind him. “You must feel really strongly about the Surran boy.”
“I wanted to get back at him.”
Jaran nodded. I didn’t have to explain that by ‘him’ I meant father, not Lyo. “Does it feel satisfying now?” he asked.
“For the moment.” I knew that would change, but I might as well hold on to my defiance for as long as I could. I closed my eyes. Was I strong enough to summon my magic yet? Jaran would see, but if I escaped I wasn’t sure I cared.
There was nothing. No sense inside me that I could change so much as a hair on my head. My stomach growled.
“Father will make you pay.”
I didn’t need the reminder. “I know.”
“Do you have a plan?”
“The plan was not to get caught in the first place.”
“But if I let you go now – do you have a plan?”
“You’d do that?”
“I persuaded Father to let you stew a day. His plan is to beat you senseless and put you in a cart to Surran. I don’t think you should meet your new husband adorned with bruises. We wouldn’t want King Zalar to get the idea that that’s how to treat Muirland women, would we?”
I reached inside me, but there was still nothing. “I need to eat.” I was basing my magical knowledge on what Pell had told me, but he acted like he knew what he was talking about. And the ache in my stomach told me food wouldn’t hurt, even if I had to run away from Muirland City on my own, human feet.
“Eat?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Are you joking, sis? You’d rather eat than escape?”
“No. I can’t escape if I’m hungry.” He didn’t understand, and I didn’t want to enlighten him, not fully.
“You’ve got until morning, then Father will beat you until you can’t move. Does dinner seem like a priority?”