“Libertas, soldier.” Troy ordered her kindly. She loosened her posture then, and met Troy’s eyes for the first time. She wondered if he would submit her for discipline. Troy had no desire to do so. “What’s going on Athena?” he asked with the affect of disappointment.
“It was an honor killing.” Athena spoke quietly. As a mechanism in the Goldcrest legal apparatus, Troy was intimately familiar with the tradition of honor killing. When a man decided to give up intelligence intended for the Friends of the Friends, he would become marked for death. He would then have twenty four hours to publicly confess his traitorous intentions before a professional hitman ended his life. If another person chose to kill him during this twenty four hour period in which his honor was false, it was considered to be an ‘honor killing’. The killer was always rewarded, and granted a legal pardon for their actions.
“What was the treachery?”
“Unknown. Permission to investigate?”
The decision at hand was a complicated one. In the days before the Second Golden campaign, investigation would have been out of the question. The Friends ruled the democratic wing of the metropolitan legal system, and even if the murderer were discovered with the bloody murder weapon in hand, they would be proclaimed innocent. Now, however, in the city’s state of institutional disarray, the opportunity had presented itself to set a new precedent. If Athena were allowed to pursue and punish the assassin, a forceful message would be sent. Troy would doubtless be punished for allowing such a thing to take place, but the prospect was tempting nonetheless. The little hatred Troy harbored in his kind heart was for the hypocrisy of The Friends.
“Speak to me as a peer, Athena. Tell me what you want to do.” Athena regarded Troy with fading derision. She wanted to despise the voice that spoke out against military discipline, but Troy was impossible to dislike. She let her level of formality drop yet another level.
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“With respect, the mob needs to be shown how little power they hold. Let me beat them into place.”
“Athena….”
“The time has never been better to establish real law.”
“And what would you do with the assassin?”
“I would break him….”
“What does that entail?”
“And then I would kill him.”
Troy let his helmed forehead fall into his palm, and took a moment to observe the teenagers baring their wounded companion up the Sacroas Steps. If Troy gave his blessing, he would be punished. Perhaps he would be fined. Perhaps he would be demoted. Perhaps his family would suffer. If The Friends discovered his involvement, his three sisters might be hurt. His mother might be killed in her bed with another knife reading ‘traitor’. It was not a risk that could be taken, not even now. There was still hope, though, for Athena was not afraid to break the law. Perhaps she would go on anyway.
“No. I do not order you to investigate this honor killing, Athena ex Pilagius. Go now, soldier. Close the gate on your way out.”
One day prior, Athena had moved into the Gonzaga room in the Carnegie dorms of the paladins’ guild headquarters. If she retired to bed, as she would naturally do, she would not have to pass through the gates to do so. Troy hoped that by suggesting that she leave, he had made it clear that they were in agreement about what should be done. She saluted him with a hand to her chest, and departed the guild district. She gave him one last look of camaraderie as she sealed the etheric lock on the gate behind her.