1
There was still time until daybreak, but the roughly cobbled yard behind the third garrison barracks was already bustling with activity. In that square yard, near the tall back wall, stood an imposing wooden platform. The construct was certainly a show of quality carpentry in its manifold utility, well suited even for musical performances of extravagant splendor.
Of course, no music was going to be played anywhere near that stage.
On the broad platform, near the front edge, was nailed a thick, stained block of wood, where human beings could be beheaded with ease, on top of it providing unobstructed visibility for the audience below on the slightly slanted yard.
High over the stage was also raised a long, thick bar, with several mechanical trap doors under it, enabling the hanging of as many as eight people at the same time, side by side. Additionally, in the ground before the platform, a suitably wide distance apart, two tall stakes were embedded, upon which offenders could be burned without them becoming too much of a distraction from the rest of the show.
Why such a variety of torments for the wicked? Was not one method of death perfectly sufficient for all? Clearly not, in the lawmakers’ opinion.
Being beheaded was by all means the least painful of deaths that could be granted to a person by the current standards of technology, and therefore reserved for the less corrupt villains. Random killers, average murderers, repeated offenders—and those who found themselves in the bad books of the elite, through no obvious fault of their own, such people were granted a quick and simple way out of life.
Being hung, slowly suffocating to death—if not immediately freed from the agony via a broken neck—was naturally a level more agonizing as an experience.
It was mostly bandits, pirates, assassins, and others leading a dedicated life of crime, who had this cruel fate coming. One needed multiple innocent lives on their conscience, or to otherwise pose a significant threat to public security and property, before they would find themselves with a noose tightened around their necks. So that they could have a minute or two to reflect on their wrongdoings, before the merciful release of eternity. The Empire was by no means unreasonable or unfair with its verdicts. Generally speaking.
Who then should be burned?
As the most painful and dramatic of all available methods of execution, those to be burned were, as follows, the vilest of lawbreakers known in all the land. Conspirators, traitors, serial killers, witches, non-humans, and such, who horrified the common populace with their wicked deeds and loathsome existence alone. Those who deserved to suffer as much as they had made others suffer, and preferably more. Not many of this variety were tried per year, but a few now and then.
Rumors had it that today was going to be one of those days.
Lured by the gossip of someone being burned after so long, more people than usual had gathered at the execution grounds. Already well before the garrison gates were opened, a crowd of ragtag locals from the slums had pooled in the narrow, squalid street outside, waiting to be let in. Seeing those even worse off than they were, those they could hate without reservation, without fear of punishment—for many in these parts, this was the only solace to be found in their miserable lives.
But no one could foretell exactly what manner of a spectacle awaited them.
As the gates were finally opened and the crowds shifted in, they were met with a sight that rendered them speechless.
The right stake was untaken, but tied to the one on the left, on a delicate little footing high up, was a woman of exceptional beauty. Crimson curls fluttered in the wind, framing a dignified, pale face, where in place of blind fear only a distant, apathetic look could be seen.
The woman’s wrists were bound with shackles connected by a loose chain, and the chain was fastened with rope on a metal ring near the top end of the stake, pulling her elbows above her head in a vulnerable posture. Her waist as well was tied to the stake, preventing the prisoner from moving around much.
The audience followed with dismayed looks as guards piled bundles of dry firewood in a tall hill reaching the prisoner’s feet, one after another, then to be doused with a generous helping of oil.
Even as this was done, the woman didn’t ask anyone for help or try to convince them of her innocence. She didn’t plead for her life like most in her position tended to do, sob or scream, but only stared off into the sunrise, altogether ignoring the presence of other people.
What had such a noble-looking person done to deserve such a fate? It was a bit difficult for the elderly in the audience to understand. By the costly-looking white shirt and black trousers, the more educated could infer a connection to the military, but no rank insignia or other details to help with identification were visible. The prisoner didn’t even have shoes.
Though they knew not the verdict yet, the majority quickly went on to make up one of their own: a witch.
Surely the woman was a vile demoness, an enchantress who had abused her beauty to mask her overflowing malice from unsuspecting victims, and had crawled and clawed her way deep into the heart of the Imperial capital, before some valorous soul had finally caught her.
With a shudder, people quickly averted their faces.
More guards than usual were stationed at the execution grounds, around the occupied stake in particular. Intimidating, black-armored knights stood among ordinary army troops, members of the legendary Imperial elite. Even the less informed residents of the Gralia district quickly developed a wordless understanding that the execution today—and the identity of the “witch” in particular—was of a very delicate nature.
The citizens were going to witness the making of history and so followed the developments under tense, cautious, but hungry silence.
In time, other prisoners were marched onto the wide stage.
There was quite a line of them, men and women, young and old, their hands all bound, their faces equally miserable. Mostly criminals from the nearby areas. The great capital had more than one prison, more than one judge, and more than one execution site, for each major district of the city, so typically the faces up there were familiar. Once a sufficient audience had gathered, the garrison gates were shut again and the show was set to begin.
Next, several official-looking figures representing the law in their red-and-white robes came out of the garrison building. Judges, attorneys, local political figureheads, and jury representatives. One of these people, a balding, slim, middle-aged man, took the role of an announcer, to read out loud the secretarial notes. He alone climbed up to the stage, while the rest took a seat at a table further in the corner of the yard.
Without much suspense, they got into the business, as usual.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” the announcer spoke. “On the dawn of the twenty-first of Maarat, in the year nine hundred and ninety-nine of the thirty-third cycle: in the name of his Imperial Majesty, the following verdicts shall be put into motion, in order, starting with the least grave. The prisoners, please step forward as your name is called. Mister Jarred Bleteu, age twenty-three, for the theft of three apples and a loaf of bread, sentenced to endure thirteen whiplashes...”
“It was only half a loaf, really.”
One by one, the line of wrongdoers was processed with factory-like smoothness.
Thieves were whipped by a guard, their bared backs sliced full of deep red lines. Halfhearted jeers from the audience accompanied the criminals’ cries of agony. No doubt the lifelong scars left on this day would make them think twice before they would resort to theft again—at least, until their endless hunger made the memories of pain fade.
The next time, the number of whiplashes would be doubled.
Those unfortunate enough to get caught for the third time had their right arm cut at the wrist. The saber doing the deed was sharp enough to slice through flesh and bone with unnerving ease, making the whole procedure somewhat surreal to witness. Like the chopping of humanoid cucumbers.
The audience followed the enactment of punishments with scattered interest. These were all mere entrees and everyone was anxiously awaiting the main course.
When the mob was already turning drowsy with tedium, the atmosphere took a sharp turn tenser.
An enormous man emerged from the barracks across the yard.
Around six feet and a half tall, the man’s grotesque body looked both starved and fat, muscular at places, bony at others, his long, rough limbs dry and sinewy, like the roots of an old tree. His round, hairy stomach hung bare under a black, open-front vest. How he had managed to stuff his legs in those tight leather trousers, no one could bring themselves to guess. No easier was it to understand how he had promptly tied up the laces of his huge boots. Someone else had to have done it for him. With no other clothes, save for a black sack he had pulled over his head, hiding his whole head from view, this colossus of a man strode unhurriedly across the yard, towards the platform. Both citizens and soldiers alike pulled away from the ominous figure like he was a leper.
Pausing before the stairs leading up to the stage, the man gave the stake-bound prisoner a glance through the tiny eyeholes in the sack.
“It could be that I was born for this day,” he uttered with a relishing sigh.
The prisoner, Miragrave, returned him a glance full of spite and said nothing.
Passing the stake, the man climbed the stairs to the platform, the thick boards groaning under his weight.
Left next to the block, so far unused, was an enormous, wide-bladed axe, which the man proceeded to pick up. With no visible effort, he lifted that grotesque hunk of steel high up in the air and held it there, like a star performer with his microphone.
The audience was too frightened by the man’s appearance and reputation to greet him with cheers or whistles, however.
That reputation—how the Executioner tended to have great difficulty limiting his victims to those on the block. And how he, as a privileged champion and a war hero of the Empire, was above the very law he enforced, everyone subject to his violent whims.
Surely he was not born that way?
Raleigh Vanhersia did once bear a dignified name like any other man. Hardly anyone remembered his full name anymore, however. These days, he was commonly called with names such as, “beast”, “monster”, “asshole”, or “son of a whore”, among many others not much more flattering. Even those, who were in vain trying to promote the man as a hero of Tratovia, had to contend with the unimaginative title, “Executioner”.
Raleigh didn’t mind.
“Let’s get this started!” the man hollered, and his voice hit the crowds like a sonic blast.
Guards brought forward the next prisoner from the line, a frail, famished-looking woman.
“Miss Dolores Stevall, known also as ‘Dule’,” the announcer read in his dry tone. “Born on the sixth of Selennam, in the year nine hundred and fifty-two. For the murder of her three infants in the years nine hundred and eighty-two, eighty-four, and ninety-six...sentenced to death by beheading.”
The audience booed, slowly overcoming their dread of the executioner. Murderers of children were regrettably frequent in the poorer areas, where the residents couldn’t afford to support a proper family. The majority loathed those who resorted to such desperate measures and showed no sympathy for Dolores. To think she had managed to hide her crimes for so long, only to be exposed by a neighbor—animosity hung nauseatingly thick in the air.
The prisoner was too shocked to even speak. Pale as a sheet, the woman was brought over to the block and forced on her knees by the guards. There was a metal ring on the floor, to which her bound hands were attached, her head and neck left exposed against the block before it. A rough-made basket was placed on the other side of the block, for a predictable purpose.
With brisk steps, Raleigh walked over to the prisoner and, almost as if by an accident, dropped the axe while passing by. Shunk! The blade bit into the block, swiftly separating the captive’s head from the rest of the body with sheer mass, sending it rolling into the basket.
“Say hello to the kids for me,” the executioner remarked.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
It was now that the audience broke into bloodthirsty cheers and applause.
As if nothing out of the ordinary had happened—for it was indeed nothing out of the ordinary—the announcer went on.
“Mister Ival Alais Sehekam from Tuval, born on the twenty-eighth of Maarat, in the year nine hundred and sixty-two, for the calculated murder of his son-in-law, sentenced to death by beheading.”
Time after time again, the axe fell.
As if sweeping away garbage someone kept leaving on his block, Raleigh decapitated the convicts with downright disrespectful disinterest. One after the other, the guards kept emptying the basket of severed heads into a pile at the base of the platform, for the audience to gawk at, while the headless corpses were dragged away and cast into a large cart waiting behind the stage. In another quarter of an hour, the stage was made slippery for all the spilled blood.
After about fifteen prisoners had lost their lives before justice, the executioner suddenly lifted his boot up on the bloodied block and stopped.
“I can’t do this,” he announced in a dejected tone.
“S-sir…?” the announcer gave the man a startled look. Whenever Raleigh got into such a mood, no one could tell what would happen next.
“This, this air...I don’t like it,” the man said. “I can’t keep going like this.”
“W-whatever do you mean, sir? It doesn’t seem any different to me.”
“Yes. I’m not you. And you’re not me.”
“T-that’s obvious, no…?” the Imperial official nervously swallowed. He felt the stare of the unseen eyes behind the black hood sink into him.
“You’re stammering,” Raleigh said. “You’re...nobody. While I—I am an entertainer.”
“An...entertainer?”
“Yes. That’s what we’re here for. This is entertainment. These people have come here to have fun. Everything we do is for the sake of their pleasure. For their thrill. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be here, now would they?”
“I assumed we were here to uphold the law,” the announcer suggested.
“Which is entertainment,” the executioner replied. “The law doesn’t exist for trifling, trendy notions of right and wrong. It’s to appease people, to humor them, to make them feel things are working out, somehow, that those who do injustice to them are destroyed, because that’s what makes them happy and content. Do you see? In light of this, we are all fools, clowns, you and me, and the main difference between us is that I know this.”
“I-is that so…? And, what exactly do you mean to say by this?”
“We need to brighten up the mood a little.”
“Brighten the mood?”
“Fire. We need fire,” a grim voice carried through the black cloth. “I want to see flames. I want one roasted wench, with screams of agony. Right. Now.”
“But, sir,” the official protested. “We have orders to keep from burning the prisoner until further instructions arrive—”
“—I am the law here!” The large man stepped up to the announcer, grabbed his robe front and lifted him up in the air with one arm. Turning, Raleigh held the official over the edge of the platform.
“To tell you what, I can’t stand it,” the executioner whispered. “The way I hear them speak of that harlot. I hear hope in their tones. Respect. Respect, for a hole? No one ever spoke of me with such pride. Though I gave up so much for this land. Do you have any idea what I gave? What I took? For this land that’s not even my own? I GAVE UP EVERYTHING! Do you understand!?”
“Sir, his majesty will not allow—”
Raleigh didn’t listen to the announcer’s objections, but let go of him.
The robed man fell eight feet down from the stage, onto the uneven pavement below, and was left lying there, groaning in agony while holding his leg. It seemed he had twisted or broken his ankle. Guards hurried to drag the man to safety.
Meanwhile, the hooded giant approached one of the fire pits set up on the stage and took out a burning branch. Then, ignoring the guards’ alarmed gestures, he turned back to face the prisoner at the stake and held the torch high up.
“Marafel!” he shouted at her. “My gift to you! I’d much like to give you something more of myself—but you don’t deserve it.”
Raleigh tossed the branch into the pile of wood under the stake. Shortly, the flames caught onto the streaks of oil and started to spread. The dour, gray morning was becoming simultaneously obfuscated by black smoke—and brightened up by the growing dance of fire.
Everyone’s eyes, guards and crowds alike, were stolen by the tragic sight of a woman in deadly peril. But Raleigh, too impatient to follow the slow growth of the flames, returned to his prior business and howled,
“Next!”
Stepping forward, the next prisoner approached the block. Indeed, she did so of her own volition, without any guards to force her, as if eager to get rid of her head. The executioner, who rarely paid any attention to who he was putting down, now looked at the convict closer with a frown.
Besides her behavior, there was something else off about her.
It was a young woman, a foreigner by the looks of her. Face too clean and full for an impoverished beggar of the slums. Instead of the prisoner’s garb or civilian clothing, she was dressed in a light, form-fitting gambeson, breeches, and leather shoes. Not a very feminine attire, or cheap. A soldier or a mercenary?
“Well, hello there,” the woman greeted the executioner with a cheerful smile. “Love the sack. I feel easier in the crowds too, when people can’t see my face. Though I usually wear shades, not bags, but I guess this world doesn’t have Ray Ban.”
“And who the Hel are you?” Raleigh asked.
Without the announcer and his list, the prisoner’s identity was left unstated.
“Itaka Izumi,” the prisoner answered on her own. “Born on the twenty-fourth of August, in the year—well, I’ll leave that to your imagination. You wouldn’t believe me anyway, and a woman’s age is something of a sensitive matter. Oh, as for my crime—I tried to kill the Emperor. Am still trying, actually. And pretty soon will.”
“...So there was someone even more insane than I left in this city?” the executioner remarked after a confused pause. “As you wish then. Onto the block.”
Izumi obediently knelt before the blood-stained stump of wood bearing the scars of numerous axe blows. One of the guards recovered enough to come bind her hands to the metal ring next to it.
The audience was torn between which show to watch, the final moments of the valiant redhead witch, or the beheading of the suspicious madwoman.
Ultimately, the former won.
The gluttonous fire was already reaching the young Colonel’s feet. Grimacing for the growing heat, Miragrave struggled to pull away from the flames, but the tight binds did their job impeccably. Izumi’s eccentricity failed to leave an impression next to that desperate, hopeless struggle. Not even the executioner himself noticed when the prisoner on the block muttered something quietly under her breath.
“Brandt.”
In a hurry to get rid of this grating interruption, Raleigh absentmindedly raised the heavy axe into another act of murder, of nominal justice.
——But as soon as he did, Izumi already bounced back up to her feet and faced the axe, her hands released from their smoking bounds. Thrusting her right arm up, she blocked the weapon’s path by seizing the bottom end of the handle, and said,
“Boo.”
Startled, Raleigh reflexively applied more strength into his arms, to force down the weapon and cut the woman down. Next to his mass, she was certainly nothing more than a humanoid toothpick. His move unexpectedly met no resistance. Izumi, receiving his wrist, turned away from under the attack. Quickly spinning three fourths of a circle around, she aimed a back kick at the executioner’s left knee to further unbalance him, and then threw the staggered man over her hip.
“Graahh!”
His shoes sliding on blood, Raleigh rolled over and landed on his back on the block, his raw mass turned against him.
Before he could recover, Izumi lifted her arm high up and dropped to elbow the cloaked face with all her weight. Like a blunt guillotine’s blade, her strike connected. A grotesque crunch sounded from the man’s neck, and the executioner’s body rolled limply down from the platform, dropping onto the pavement below with a nasty, flat slap.
The sudden turn of events finally stole the spectators’ attention. A collective gasp of surprise drowned out even the crackling of flames.
“Okay, here goes nothing...”
Picking up Raleigh’s dropped greataxe, Izumi briefly gauged its weight and faced the infernal pyre. Then, lifting the mighty weapon overhead with both hands, she took a long step forward, drawing forth all her might, and flung the slab of metal across the air.
“Haa—!”
Slicing through the smoke with an eerie whoom-whoomp, the spinning axe hit its mark, the top end of the stake sticking up from the flaming pile. The stake was shattered by the impact, split lengthwise from top to bottom, with splinters flying in every direction. The audience covered their eyes and recoiled.
Simultaneously, the ropes tying the prisoner to the stake were loosened.
Miragrave’s arms regained a degree of mobility and she hurried to pull them free. Slamming her numb palms down at the binds across her waist, she gathered focus and grunted,
“Firis!”
Burned instantly away by a spell several tiers above a mere rune, the robes broke to ash, and the prisoner was released. Bearing with the heat and pain, Miragrave quickly secured a better footing amid the burning mound of firewood, and took a wild leap across the fire. After the steep dive, she landed rolling onto the pavement, before the eyes of the bewildered people. The witch had been released! The spectators hurried to back away the best they could, looking genuinely horrified.
Disregarding their shocked stares and gestures of warding, Miragrave frantically patted out the flames that had caught onto her trousers and shirt hems, forcing out of her mind the agonizing demise she had so narrowly avoided.
It was hardly the time to celebrate.
Unrest spread quickly.
The stunned guards were starting to remember their role in the performance and clutched their spears, trying to restore order. Two close by rushed towards the captive to detain her. One was a soldier from the garrison, the other a knight of the Imperial elite, veiled in the ever-familiar black armor.
Dealing with simple guards was one thing, but fighting off the Stohenkartes unarmed was a lot asked. Even if she could move again, Miragrave was far from unharmed or in top condition, never mind ready for a fight for her life.
Fortunately, she didn’t need to test her luck either. The black knight hadn't been in a hurry to apprehend her, after all. Instead, the soldier suddenly tackled the garrison sentry from the side and punched him without much restraint. The guard was knocked out and fell to the ground, adding to the surrounding confusion. Fearing they would get caught in a fight between two armed forces, the locals succumbed in a state of general panic and began to pour towards the exit like one vague, gelatinous mass. Somewhere, an alarm bell started ringing, augmenting the already chaotic assault on the senses.
The unknown knight quickly crouched by the downed guard and went through his equipment, before turning back to Miragrave.
“Colonel,” a light voice spoke through the helmet visor, and the knight threw Miragrave a bundle of keys. “Your chains. Take his sword and fly. We’ll hold them back for as long as we can.”
“...Marceille, is it?” Miragrave noted, recognizing the voice, and caught the keys. “I’m in your debt.”
“No, ma’am. I am in yours. I thought I would go through fire for you, but I found that I could not. Fear held me back. This cowardice will stain my honor to the end of my days. But rest assured, the Divines know I will not hesitate again.”
“Don’t die. That's an order.”
The knight named Marceille nodded and dashed to assist her comrades in holding back the garrison guards, and help the citizens escape.
“Medium-rare, or well done?” Izumi asked, suddenly appearing from the surrounding smoke and chaos.
“How and why in the blazes are you here?” Miragrave asked her with a scowl.
“I came to rescue you, why else?” Izumi replied with a shrug. “Although, I have to say there’s no plan from here on. I thought I’d just improvise things until this point, and leave the rest to you. Since planning is more your line of business.”
“It can’t be called a rescue until your target is in safety,” Miragrave told her. “But a distraction you’ve certainly made. We’ll have to make use of that.”
“How do we get out then? Blend with the crowd and sneak past the guards?”
“No,” the former Colonel shook her head. “No one’s getting out. Now that the alarm has been sounded, all the garrison will rush in to restore order. They will seal off the block and comb through the crowds and buildings until they find what they want. And slay those who resist.”
“But there is a way out, right?”
“We must take the path they least expect us to. Head into the barracks.”
“Hiding in the vipers’ nest?” Izumi scratched her ear. “I sure didn’t expect that.”
“We’re not hiding,” the woman told her. “Down in the cellars, there is an underground passage. Not many know about it. It will take us outside Gralia district and to the outskirts. Unnoticed, if we're lucky.”
“Not to look the gift horse in the mouth, but how do you know about it?” Izumi asked.
“I enlisted here,” Miragrave sternly answered. “This place is my second home. Now move it. If we are very, very lucky, the building will be empty. Try not to attract any more attention than you already have.”
Using the bewildered crowds and the smoke from the scattered fire for cover, the two made their way towards the tall barracks across the yard.
“But what’s the catch?” Izumi couldn’t help but ask as they ran. “It’s not going to be this easy, is it?”
Looking cautiously around, Miragrave responded,
“I don’t see Zaxon anymore. He was in the crowd, but disappeared after the commotion began. Expect trouble.”
And, under her breath, impossible for Izumi to hear, she added,
“He’s the one who showed me the passage.”