The Duelist 7, page 15
“He broke the mirror over there,” Mozz added in a deadpan voice. “And then Rylan…”
Rylan shuddered and closed his eyes as his grip on the sharp object tightened. More drops of blood fell to the floor, and I wondered how he didn’t feel it.
“I see. You knew Bartus was going to hurt Mozz, hm?” I said in a soothing timbre directed at Rylan. For a second, I didn’t know if he was hearing me, but after a moment, he gave a stiff nod. “And then Mr. Jenner came in, and you knew he would be a target, too, right? So, you did what you had to do.”
I moved more into his line of sight, and I blocked the view of the man he’d killed in order to get him to snap out of the dark thoughts no doubt swirling around in his head.
Killing a person, no matter how much the bastard may have deserved it, came with its own weight, and if I could have anything, I would have it so my son never needed to take a life. If we were in my world, I could have potentially shielded him from this, but we were not in my world.
This was Aventoll, and unfortunately, violence and killing was almost unavoidable.
The best I could do for him was just be there for the fallout like this, but the fact he’d yet to say a single word had me floundering.
Luckily, before I could lose all faith in my abilities as a father, he blinked once, and then he focused his gaze on me for the first time since I’d entered the small storage cupboard.
“He… I heard him,” he whispered, and I leaned forward so I could hear him better. “He wanted to… do things to Mozz, and I--”
He choked and gagged, but then he hissed as he finally noticed the shard of jagged mirror glass in his hand.
“Shhh,” I soothed when he cried out, and then I caught his wrist so I could gently pry his stiff fingers away.
The makeshift knife clattered to the ground, and suddenly I had my arms full as Rylan launched himself at me. He didn’t make any noise, but he shook violently, and I could feel a telltale dampness start to bleed through my tunic where he’d buried his face in my chest.
“You did good, kid,” I murmured into his messy crown. “I’m proud of you, and Mozz and Jenner are both okay. You did the right thing.”
“I killed him,” he croaked into my shirt. “I slashed his throat.”
“I know,” I said as I rubbed his back, and without thinking, I dropped a kiss on the top of his shaggy head. “You did good.”
Zoie then crouched down next to both of us, and Rylan pulled back so he could look at her.
“Kit,” she said simply as she stroked his tear-streaked face.
“M-Mommmm,” he sobbed, and the cat-woman gathered him in her arms so she could now comfort our son the way only a mother could.
Once I knew the crisis was averted for now, I left them to it and stood so I could join the rest of the conversations taking place behind me.
“You’re sure the illusionist troupe are pirates?” Griss had just asked the Major.
“My intel is sound,” the large Terran said with a nod. “My lieutenants were able to… ‘persuade’ some of the jugglers for information. They were commissioned by Bartus some time ago when he realized the Ascension Accord was a sure thing. He was going to leave Terr along with pirates, who were going to transport all of their ‘stock’ to the Traders so he could make off with some premium coin.”
“So, that is why they only picked female ‘volunteers’ for the demonstration,” Horus said with a disgusted scowl. “Pathetic. It’s good he’s dead.”
“The only thing I rue is not killing him myself,” Tharfin growled as he continued to hold his niece against his side.
Zoie had managed to get Rylan up to his feet even though he had to lean on her pretty heavily. Then Shay came up on his right side and carefully took his injured hand in hers so she could heal it.
“The way I see it, this young lad has done us all a great service,” Griss said and took a step toward my son so he could salute him. “Thank you, Mr. Daal.”
Everyone else in the room followed suit by thumping their right fists over their hearts.
Rylan just stared at all of them in mild surprise. His face was still pretty pale with shock so his lack of response didn’t surprise me so much as it worried me, and I found Zoie’s eyes.
She nodded imperceptibly, and both Shay and Zoie began to escort Rylan out of the cramped room already starting to stink of the corrupt pervert.
Before he left, he was stopped by both Mozz and Tharfin as they each gave him a fierce hug, and then my wives took him away.
“Come on,” Regent Sskern said as he gave a kick to the corpse for good measure. “We have the troupe members who didn’t manage to die in custody. As we speak, we are rallying for a quick trial and could use a good augur-mage.”
“We would be much obliged,” Amaya chimed in as her sister nodded in agreement.
“Lord Mec,” Griss said as all of us began to make our way back to the banquet hall. “Would you be amenable to joining me on this council of retribution?”
“Absolutely,” the ram-lord said. “The moment they tried to kidnap citizens of Nata makes them enemies of my house as well. Justice will be served.”
When we entered the hall, there was a group of interesting scientist-type Terrans examining the still-floating cube, while several of the Upper concubines and Lower miners were holding some of the troupe members in custody.
“What shall we do with the scum?” Lieutenant Vertiss asked as he shook Lord Licorice by the scruff of his neck.
“That remains to be seen,” Major Tharfin told his second as he glared at the ruby-bedecked fruit loop.
“My fellow Terrans!” Griss boomed around the large banquet hall loud enough to get everyone’s attention. “Lord Bartus’ treachery has been revealed, and I am giving all of you this one chance to come forward if you were involved with him and his most nefarious plot to abscond with our women-folk. If you do the honorable thing and reveal yourselves now, I may grant you leniency.”
The silence remained for several long seconds in which no one spoke up or moved a muscle, even though several glances slid to the exit now being guarded by more of Tharfin’s men.
“Very well,” Sskern said and then nodded at Amaya and Anwaar to proceed.
What happened next was a truly mega-awesome demonstration of the augur-mage’s combined powers in full force.
First, the sisters linked hands as both their eyes took on that eerie otherworldly glow. Then, while they were still connected, they both crouched as one unit so Amaya could press her palm against the ground again.
She was as still as a statue, but the energy coming off her in waves was potent and caused the hair to stand up on my arms as if there was an electrical storm in the atmosphere.
Just before I was convinced the very air was going to burst into flames, the augur-mage stood. Then, with her eyes still glowing their technicolor array, Anwaar held out her glowing red palm and swept it over the captive audience.
“May justice compel you!” the augur-mage pair said in a shared monotone voice that was the stuff of nightmares.
Suddenly, three individuals were highlighted in the same red light as the ibex-woman’s hand, and when she clenched her fist, the men staggered toward the center of the hall like they’d lost all control over their limbs.
But, going by their terrified expressions, this was the last place they wanted to be headed.
“Seize them!” Griss commanded, and some of his concubine guard including the pink-haired Issa came up to hold the men. “You three, announce yourselves to the assembled court.”
The defectors looked like they would remain silent until death, but one gesture from Amaya had the first man, a weaselly skink-looking motherfucker, blurting out all his information as if he had a bad case of diarrhea.
Of the mouth.
“L-Lord Hervin,” he panted. “Rank-Two. Shipbuilder. Bartus was going to give me a cut of the gold if I gave him a ship from one of my workshops.”
“What about you?” Griss asked the next man in line, who resembled a trike with only one of his three horns still intact. He was also wearing the same insignia of two overlapping circles like the rest of the scientist types, and the Terran Lord made a point to glance down at the emblem.
“I am… Jerres,” the trike-man gritted out. “Rank-Four. Professor of Natural Sciences.”
“What do you have to say for disgracing the noble Terran Academy like this Sskern interjected.
“Lord Bartus promised me gold beyond my dreams if I was able to engineer something that could make the container float in the air,” he explained as he pointed to the cube. “Before the ceremony, I had the workers place powerful magnets in the floor and told them it was for something else. There is a small device in my pocket which activates them.”
“I’ll take that, then,” Issa said as she retrieved the small hand-held item from him that looked like a garage door remote without any buttons.
“And you?” Griss asked the next man in line with the features of some kind of spiky reptile.
“Lord Kaxsus,” he spat out begrudgingly. “Rank-Three. Palace Marshal. I offered him access to a squaller of his choice for the chance to take over ‘minding’ the Low-ish scum he kept at his disposal.”
“What does that mean?” Lord Mec asked with a dark scowl.
“Means ol’ Barty had certain predilections pertaining to torture when it came to the Low-ish,” the man named Kaxsus said with sinister glee. It seemed as if Amaya didn’t really have to force him to speak anymore because now that the jig was up, he apparently didn’t mind sharing. “Every now and again, Bart and I would take a little trip by squaller to the Lowers, see? Pick up a ripe little scat-ling for us to have fun with.”
“How dare you!” Leader Zerr thundered as he came to the forefront of the crowd. “You’ve been harvesting our people so you may maim and torture them for your own sick pleasure?”
My stomach churned at the way Kaxsus just laughed out a rusty laugh.
“I’ve heard enough,” Griss said. “How about you, Lord Mec?”
“I agree,” the ram-lord said and turned to his sisters. “What say the augur-mage?”
“Our findings are the same as what has been spoken by the accused,” Amaya answered, and the two of them returned to normal.
“Whatever shall we do for recompense, then?” Griss asked as he opened up the dialogue to the room at large. “What is a fair punishment, people of Terr?”
“Death! Death!” The crowd instantly started chanting until someone added on the phrase “by Ocean,” and then the chant changed to, “Death by Ocean!”
Horus sucked in a sharp breath next to me, and I turned to him with a puzzled frown.
“Why isn’t anyone challenging him to a Duel?” I asked over the din.
“Engaging in the Rite of the Duel is considered an honor even if the Duelist being challenged is a mega bastard,” the falcon-man explained. “But there are some types of corruption where the chance of redemption through Dueling is not even an option because of how disgraceful that person’s crimes are. In that case, only the Goddess can judge them and mete out punishment.”
“For all three of them?” I questioned. “Kaxus, yeah, he definitely needs to die in a horrible way, but the other two?”
“It is not up to us,” he said since the angry crowd was on the verge of turning into an angry mob if something didn’t happen soon.
“Terrans value their kin above all else.” Horus and I jumped slightly at the sound of Thas’ voice, and I wondered how long he’d been standing behind us. “To hear that these men were in a plot to break up families and sell our women and children is unforgivable. Horus is correct. None of these men deserve the glory of dying in a Duel.”
“It is decided!” Griss cried out and raised his palms up so the audience would settle down. “For their crimes, the three men will be stripped of their titles, their Duelist Stones shattered, and then thrown to the Ocean Mercedes.”
At this declaration, the whole hall erupted into chaos.
Chapter 13
I’d never been a part of an angry riotous mob hell-bent on seeking capital punishment for obvious reasons, so if anyone asked me six months ago if I’d ever be screaming for justice alongside everyone else, I would have said no.
But currently, that was exactly what I was doing, sans the torch and pitchfork, as I followed in the wake of the group of criminals heading for their deaths. There were at least four members of the illusionist pirate troupe including Lord Licorice and the monkey-guy I’d knocked out before I killed his twin.
And in front of them leading the pack were the three Terran traitors, which made a total of seven people.
At first, I didn’t really relish the idea of marching a group of people to their executions because I occasionally liked to think I was born of a society a little more civilized, but I quickly stopped that line of thinking when more of these people’s crimes were revealed.
One of the interesting customs these Terrans observed was a pleasant thing Lord Griss dubbed The March of Repentance down to something called The Cave of Judgement. To my recent knowledge, this was the last chance the criminals had to avoid Death by Ocean by being compelled to confess their crimes by the augur-mage.
Amaya and Anwaar had once again linked hands as they urged the pack of degenerates along from behind. Both of their eyes were glowing along with each of their free hands, and the mage kept them moving while the augur-woman kept them talking.
And talk, they did.
Each criminal spewed their guts about every misdeed or indiscretion that had ever harmed another person until every single one of them dissolved into silent tears of guilt and remorse.
All except one.
Kaxsus.
He, apparently, had a lot of shit to confess to, and where everyone else ran out of horrid crimes about three-quarters of the way down the sharp switchbacks, this sick fuck was still going.
In fact, somewhere along the way he even seemed to pick up steam just like when he was confessing about him and Bartus, and the way his beady eyes gleamed as he described the perverted and fucked-up shit they would do to the undeserving Lower Terrans made my jaw clench.
But when he started talking about the things he and his buddy Bartus used to do to children?
Yeah, that was when I threw my lot in with the crowd and started demanding bloody retribution just like everyone else, fuck evolved morality. People who messed with children deserved to die a thousand deaths in the worst way possible, and to me, no amount of confession or Hail Marys or whatever the fuck could even remotely begin to exonerate a person for that.
Not like Kaxsus wanted to be exonerated anyway, given the manic glee that seemed to roll off him even when he finally stopped confessing.
Lord Griss had the mob come to a stop at the bottom of the nearly mile-long trek, and we all amassed in anticipation in front of the entrance of a dark cave.
“My people!” the dino-man said as his neck frill umbrellaed out and flashed a vibrant yellow to catch everyone’s attention. “Now is the time to claim reparations for the terrible misdeeds laid against us by these deplorable reprobates!”
I added my voice to the roar of the crowd when everyone jeered and cheered.
“I hope they burn in the darkest of darkhells,” Horus said from his position next to me, and his voice was rife with the same wrath I felt burning a hole inside of me.
“Now, only those who have been directly wronged by these loathsome scum may bear witness to the Reckoning,” Griss announced, and all of us who almost had our wives and daughters whisked away to the insanely fucked-up sex trade stepped forward.
Thas, Vertiss, and Serrek helped pass out torches for the people going into the cave, but I also made sure my Duelist Stone was untucked from my shirt so it would give off its own shine.
I remembered how dark the caves of Terr could get, and as we continued on the slightly downward slope, I was grateful for the extra points of light from all of the other Duelists-- newbies and vets alike.
Especially because there was something markedly different about this cave.
First was the sound.
The draft that was blowing in and out had the effect of someone breathing as if they were in a deep slumber, and every time it wafted over me, the hairs on my arms and neck stood on end.
Whatever else this Cave of Judgement was, it was definitely alive, and it was good the walk wasn’t very long considering how dark and endless the cave appeared from the outside. That fact was just another reminder of how supernaturally pitch-black this high cavern was because by all rights, we should have still been able to see the torchlights from all of the people waiting back at the entrance.
I swallowed thickly, and my mouth went dry as a power I’d never felt before shrouded me like a thick lead blanket. It was as oppressive as it was awe-inspiring, and even Kaxsus seemed to finally realize where his place was in the cosmos.
About five hundred feet from the entrance, we all stopped at the edge of an inky shallow pool with something that looked like a mound or a hill rising up from the center. When I squinted at it through the dimness, I was just able to make out the mound had a hole at the top, which made it look a little bit like a science-fair model volcano, and from it came the sound of the Ocean tide.
This, at least, explained the illusion that the cave was breathing. This cavern must be close to Terr’s natural bluffs, and over years of crashing and violent waves, the sea ended up punching a hole through the rock and formed this place.
As the rest of the witnesses finished filing in around the shallow pool, I gripped my torch in my hand tight enough that the leather straps around the handle began to creak.
