Morwen marched behind two emerald armored spell warriors with ornate spear rifles. It felt like a funerary procession for her career. She knew the all too real possibility existed that this might also be for the ultimate stakes. Her own potential execution as well.
Federation law was a curious thing. Whoever had the most credits usually got the verdict, and Morwen did not have credits. Instead, she was gambling with a very volatile and oft unused currency. Service achievements.
As the bastard daughter of a divorced noble house, and the oft unrecognized daughter of the ArchPriest? She had very little money to her name. She’d financed most of her career off of donations and securing whatever she needed through barter and trade. That’s probably why the dwarves liked her so much. She was easy to take advantage until she learned their rules.
The double doors opened up to the familiar great hall that had been co-opted by the brass for the proceedings. Since there was no centralized command structure to the Federation, they had dispatched three representatives to oversee the proceedings. She recognized Rayshe, and Admiral Brown. The man in the sharp business suit, however, she wasn’t familiar with. She knew he was in charge of a great proportion of the Order of Aeryn.
“Welcome everyone. I’m Admiral Brown. This is Allosius Rayshe, and to my left is Mr. Ilmont of the Order of Aeryn. We’re here because this tribunal has weighed the reports and information and has decided that there are merits worthy enough to conduct a formal court martial. The accused, Captain Morwen, sits before us. Would you like a defender appointed to you?”
“No.” Morwen said stoically as she sat down.
Brown sighed in exasperation and shook his head. He struck Morwen as very disinterested in this entire process. “Very well. The accused has waived her right to counsel. Would you like to make an opening statement, Captain?”
“I would.”
“This ought to be good,” Rayshe said with a scowl.
“I will have order in these proceedings. Y’all asked me to come out here and officiate this hearing since you lack even a basic sense of military command decorum. You’re wastin’ my time, and I won’t tolerate sideways comments like that. Make another an I’ll knock your block off into next week my own self. Are we clear?”
“Crystal.” Rayshe said through narrowed eyes. He folded his arms and leaned back to resume looking down at her from his too perfect nose.
Satisfied with Rayshe’s submission to rule, Brown turned back to Morwen, “Captain, please begin.” He tapped a little wooden hammer ceremoniously.
It struck Morwen as too small and dainty to be a weapon of war. So it must have been an object of pure ceremony. Some kind of human tradition, no doubt. Morwen cleared her throat and stood up, taking a moment to smooth her uniform jacket. Her ribbon racks a colorful tapestry of stripes and patterns amidst several bronze colored medals made her swell with pride. She took a deep breath, chin up, chest out. She would go down nobly.
“Gentleman of this board. I stand accused of murder. A charge I won’t deny. I made my decision because if I didn’t, more lives would have been lost. The Federation would have lost Hidros. Possibly more, it’s difficult to say for certain. He forced me to make a judgement call. One life for many. I didn’t want to make that choice. Lt. Rayshe pressed it upon me. However, I would make the same choice again. The only regret I have is that Lt. Rayshe’s pride blinded him to the greater picture.”
“My son was not prideful! You were simply a terrible captain and I’ll see you executed the same way you murdered my boy!”
“ORDER!” Brown boomed, slamming his wooden hammer down on the podium multiple times. The fire in his eyes made him look like he was ready to smack Allosius upside the head with it instead. “God damnit Rayshe, one more time. Please continue to piss me off and give me a reason.”
Allosius’s jaw clenched, but no further words issued forth. The weaselly mage scowled and looked away.
“Sit down, Captain.” Brown said, tapping the wooden mallet again. Brown took a deep breath, his barrel chested uniform jacket heaving. “Prosecution. Do you have an opening statement to make?”
Morwen finally took a moment to study the man sitting a few feet across from her at a small table. Her blood ran cold as she recognized who it was. Col. Castien. Castien was one of the few mages who excelled in law enough to practice it within the Federation. He’d built a career on the backs of others. The perfect shrewd politician. Highly educated and grossly over-funded.
Castien rose, smoothing out his own uniform jacket, which bore as much if not more decoration than Morwen’s own. To the average person, it would have been easy to assume only Morwen and Castien had been fighting the war against the Sauridius. Morwen schooled her features neutral even as Castien’s perfectly chiseled jaw made her want to wretch. His crisp high and tight haircut have his face a sharp and clean look.
“I do, Admiral. Distinguished gentleman of the board, we’re here today because a mage was murdered. A noble. During a time of war by his own superior officer, who disobeyed multiple direct orders to surrender command over to him. She already debriefed you on her reports. We have the facts. And the defense has even admitted to guilt. So we aren’t here to argue about whether the murder happened. Merely to determine what consequences are justified.”
Rayshe glared at Morwen, where Ilmont looked on impassively. Admiral Brown just looked annoyed at having to be here at all. Admiral Brown tapped his little wooden mallet and Castien sat in his seat. Brown turned to Morwen, “Captain. You have the opportunity to present your defense now.”
Morwen nodded. Before she could speak, the large double doors creaked open loudly at the rear of the auditorium echoing loudly. Everyone shifted their attention as none other than the ArchPriest himself and Lucinda strode in. The ArchPriest clad in his regal gold armor and white robes. A green signet pinned to the emerald cloak that hung over his back. Elder spell staff clacked against the tiled floor as he strode in purposefully.
“I’ve come to assist the Captain in the defense of her case.”
“Holy father… you can’t be serious!?”
Morwen turned to see Rayshe standing and turning to the Admiral. “You can’t possibly allow this!”
“ORDER! I will have order in this sham of a proceeding. Shut the hell up, Rayshe.”
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Morwen’s brows furrowed. She knew he would hate her for what she’d done, but lashing out at her father like that? Everyone loved the ArchPriest as a matter of default. It seemed odd to her he’d be so confrontationally rude to the holiest and most powerful person on Eryn.
Rayshe hissed a protest but folded his arms and resumed glaring at Morwen, this time more covertly now that her father had come. After things had a chance to slow down a bit, only then did she shift uncomfortably. She didn’t want her father here to defend her. She didn’t need his protection. She’d worked hard to claw her way free of his shadow, and the expectations of Eryn.
“Captain. Please. Make your defense before I call this whole thing off now and fly back to New Eden.”
Morwen nodded sharply. She cleared her throat to speak, taking great pains not to watch her father and Lucinda take a seat at her table. She closed her eyes to refocus for a moment, and when they opened, she spoke.
“I shot Lt. Rayshe. Yes. I make no attempts to deny the fact. As I’ve said. I had a tough choice to make. That’s because I’d been shown a prophecy.”
“You can’t be serious. You want to enter prophecies into evidence now?” Rayshe demanded.
“She speaks the truth. I presented her with a prophecy. One that if left ignored or incorrectly followed, would spell the end of the Hidros colony, and potentially our entire sector. The Sauridius would have overrun us all.”
Admiral Brown ran his hands through his short trimmed grey hair. He shook his head, struggling to make sense of the presentation. “How am I supposed to weigh that as evidence?”
The ArchPriest rose from his seat and wove several fire and mind signs. An illusory fiery scroll formed of aether, displaying the prophecy he’d given Morwen played out. No one on the panel viewed the prophecy with any interest. Ilmont looked bored, as always. Brown remained annoyed, and Rayshe wore a scandalized expression.
Morwen gave her father a pleading look to stop. He ended the spell and took a seat regally. She cleared her throat, wrestling for the courage to push forward.
“As I said. I didn’t want to execute Rayshe. But his insistence that I execute the bulk of my remaining mages on the eve of one of our most difficult battles for the fate of the sector was uncalled for. The decision I had to make was one life, or several. I made the most calculated decision I could, given the circumstances. I wish it didn’t need to be so. But here we are. I’ve never acted in a manner I felt would threaten the Federation or our people. And I’ve always put the overall mission above my personal feelings.”
She gave a final nod and took a seat to show she was done. Admiral Brown sighed, looking put upon. The old human’s mustache wiggled as his mouth twisted into a frown. He turned to Castien with a nod. “Prosecution, what do you have?”
Castien rose smoothly, giving Morwen a respectful look. He circled around his table to stand between the panel and herself. “Gentlemen of this distinguished panel, we are here to determine the circumstances of Captain Morwen’s guilt in the murder of Lt. Rayshe. She has submitted field reports and testified that she did so out of necessity. That the mission required it of her. She even had her the esteemed ArchPriest himself show us what compelled her to make the choice she did.”
He regarded her for a moment, allowing the panel to hang on to his words. Morwen knew in that moment just how good an orator Castien was. And just how dangerous he was to her. Her fingers clutched the seams of her jacket, uncertainty and fear gripping her.
“However, I find it curious and odd that she didn’t elaborate too greatly on just why exactly she was in this situation to begin with? It seems odd, doesn’t it? To have your XO randomly call for the termination of most of your mage squad?” He turned to face Morwen. The question rhetorical, but the point sat.
“Captain, if you could, explain to us why exactly the Lt. was demanding the deaths of your mages?”
“In our orbital battle with the Sauridius,” she began.
“Which you were late in arriving to.” Castien added.
Morwen ignored the interruption and continued. “We deployed a squad to take the station. It was a two pronged attack. We needed to thin the dragons ranks above Hidros, and we needed to retake the station so the Brotherhood could regain control of the system.”
“And could you tell the panel who was on this strike team?”
“Lt. Rayshe, and Private Sala, Private Akamori, and Private Amara.”
“So you deployed this strike team and trusted them to take the station. What happened when they reached the station?”
“According to Lt. Rayshe’s report, the strike team pressed into the station and encountered undead.” Morwen said.
“Those undead were the station’s occupants, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Occupants that could have been saved if you had reported when ordered?”
“No.”
“No?” Castien questioned. “What makes you so certain?”
“Because the station had already fallen by the time they issued those orders. To complicate matters, my ship direly needed resupply from our previous engagements. Had we rushed in, we wouldn’t have lasted a fraction as long as we had.”
“So command ordered you to report to Hidros and defend it, and you what? Told them to go space themselves?”
“No. I arranged for supplies so that I could prosecute an effective campaign.”
“You’re sponsored here, are you not?”
“Technically, yes.”
“Technically? Care to elaborate?”
“Sponsors normally finance the captain and crew. They provide the credits to keep the operation moving. My sponsor has failed to do that much. In fact, I suspect my unit was little more than a box check for Lt. Rayshe’s credentials.”
“So you think he was using his position in your crew as prestige?”
“I do.”
“So it’s safe to assume you didn’t think highly of him, then?”
Morwen tensed. She should have been more careful with her words. He’d walked her into that corner so easily. She took a deep breath.
“That’s incorrect. Rayshe was an experienced mage, and when his callous disregard for brotherhood, marines could be kept in check, a capable leader. He always questioned me.”
“Always questioned your orders?”
She had to approach this carefully, or he’d wind up twisting this, too. But she felt it needed said. She owed him that much.
“Yes. I valued his perspective. Sometimes I got too focused on my perspective. Rayshe had a way of keeping me grounded and ensuring I could account for the whole picture. Losing him was costly.”
“But not too costly, right? Isn’t it true you promoted Private Akamori to Lt. immediately after executing Lt. Rayshe?”
Morwen wanted to wince. She knew that would look insensitive. She didn’t have time to mourn. She had a battle against the Sauridius to win.
“Rayshe’s execution had created a power vacuum. The squad discussed the issue and agreed that Akamori would be the best to step into the Lt.’s role given his initiative and judgement. I agreed with them.”
“I’m sure that was a difficult adjustment.” Castien said, giving her a casual glance sidelong.
“In some ways. Yes. I was a man short. And the experience gap left a lot to be desired. Lt. Akamori was instrumental in our victory, but he’s a lot to learn. He’s barely more than a boy with a sword and a sharp instinct. Given time and training I believe he could rival Rayshe, or perhaps excel beyond him.”
“Why was Lt. Rayshe so set on executing your mages?”
Morwen bit her lip. She knew answering only upset Allosius, but she couldn’t bring herself to lie, either.
“The Lt. had a callous disregard for troops that weren’t his own. He often spent the Brotherhood’s marines like fodder. There was no love lost between the mages and the brotherhood, as Admiral Brown can confirm. They think we’re snobby, stuck up, stupid, and selfish. Lt. Rayshe was living up to all of those stereotypes in as maximum a fashion as he could muster.”
“So he didn’t like the Brotherhood’s marines?”
“I don’t believe so, no. We’d just gotten a replacement battalion, and he was already willing to sacrifice all their lives in Hidros station to flush out one lowly Necromancer.”
“Seems like a tactical necessity, though, doesn’t it? Take out the enemy’s key power player so you could hold the station?” Castien said.
Admiral Brown gave Castien a considerable look. Something between a glare and consideration. The Brotherhood lost men exponentially higher than the mages, but hearing about mages willingly hurling zeros to the slaughter was… eye opening to a high-ranking officer in the Brotherhood. That was good, but Morwen couldn’t leverage that right now.
“Yes. But it ran against the spirit of my orders. I specifically tasked him with taking the station while incurring as minimal losses as possible. Ordering men to unnecessary deaths when I would need them later was going to do no one any tactical favors. Between disobeying my orders and demanding unlawful executions of my mages for following my orders, I made the executive decision to execute Lt. Rayshe as I was within the spirit of the law.”