Ezekai landed, his hand reaching for his sword.
“What has been done here?” he roared to the village. “All of you, come to me and answer for this!”
Slowly they gathered, men and women lurking at the edges of homes and beyond, not daring to near the pole. None spoke. Again Ezekai demanded answers, his voice carrying. Some went running out to the fields. With each passing second of silence, Ezekai felt his anger grow.
“You,” he said, pointing at a brown-haired woman leaning against a nearby home. “Who has done this?”
“Not my place to say,” she said. “Ask the men. They’re coming.”
Another he asked, this a boy of twelve.
“My pa said not to say, not even to you,” the child insisted, and it was the truth.
Ezekai turned about and looked to the fields. A group of thirty men was approaching, instruments of their trade slung over their shoulders. He sensed no anger in them, no danger, just…caution. Next to Ezekai, the rotting body continued to slowly swing.
When the group arrived, they crossed their arms and kicked their feet into the dirt, as if waiting for something. Ezekai had no patience for any of it.
“I demand an explanation,” he said.
“He was just like Locke,” said one of the men. He was a thin fellow, and the dirt on his face looked like it belonged there. From the way the others looked to him he appeared to be the one in charge of the most recent events. “They did stuff together, the two of them. He admitted as much when we caught him peeping in through my little girl’s window.”
“You tortured this knowledge out of him?”
The men glanced to one another.
“We made him talk,” another admitted.
Ezekai closed his eyes, meaning to pray for calm, but the stench of the corpse was too near. They had killed the man, mutilated him, and then hung him up for all to see. Because of this they nearly let an innocent child die, all so they might hide their deed. When Ezekai opened his eyes, he felt fury burning in his blood.
“You tortured, mutilated, and then murdered a man,” he said to them. “Without law. Without justice. Without proof.”
“We heard it from his mouth,” someone shouted.
“He confessed!” shouted another.
“Under torture!” Ezekai insisted. “How do you know he spoke truth?”
“What of you?” asked the thin fellow with the dirty face. They were closer now, starting to surround him. “How do we know you spoke truth when you forgave Locke? If he fell on his knees and begged, would you have let that monster remain in our village?”
There was no way for Ezekai to know, and no way to explain. When Locke had cast himself to the dirt, the guilt and sorrow overwhelmed every strand of his soul, his yearning for salvation beyond anything Ezekai could describe. The man hated himself, hated his life. Ezekai had shown him a ray of light, had hoped to cure him of the vile desires, and then in that light Locke had asked for forgiveness from a man he’d wronged. That man, Colton, had murdered him in cold blood. Yet now, when faced with another similar situation, the townspeople chose not to embrace the forgiveness, but instead the murderer? It was more than Ezekai could understand. He didn’t want to understand it. He didn’t want to believe it. He cherished these people. He protected them. He loved them, even the poor, sick Saul that hung from a rope.
Ezekai lifted his sword.
“This cannot happen,” he told them. “It will not happen, not again. Not ever.”
He turned to cut free the body only to find a wall blocking him. The men were gathering together, holding their rakes, shovels, and scythes as weapons against him.
“He hangs,” said the man in charge. “We called no angel, and we’re a hundred miles from Mordeina. What Saul did deserved death by every law known to us, even yours, and we administered that law. Don’t you dare cut him down.”
“The law called for you to shred his loins? The law said your fear of being caught allows a child to die of sickness? Move aside, now.”
They did not. He saw their fear, sensed it, but they wouldn’t move. Not on their own. But Ezekai would make them. He flung himself forward, his blade whirling. Most of the men turned to flee, but a few tried to fight. Their instruments shattered against his shining blade, their worn iron nothing compared to steel forged in the smiths of eternity. Ezekai shifted, pushed, doing everything possible to harm not a single man. When he cleared the other side, he flapped his wings, rose into the air, and then sliced through the rope.
Saul’s body crumpled to the ground. Ezekai landed before it and met the eyes of those who stood against him.
“Bury him,” he commanded.
“Bury him yourself,” said the dirty-faced man. “What are you going to do if we don’t? Kill us?”
Ezekai’s jaw trembled.
“You tread on dangerous ground,” he said softly. “You aren’t above mercy. You aren’t wiser than the heavens.”
He grabbed the rope and flew, flew until he found a spot far away from the town. Landing on the soft grass, he jammed his sword into the dirt, twisted it to the side, and then tore into the ground. With his bare hands he dug free the rest. His skin was tough, but so was the ground, and it wasn’t long before drops of his scarlet blood mixed with the earth. Deeper and deeper he dug the grave, moving with greater urgency. Without a word he pushed the corpse into the hole, then started filling it. At last it was finished, and with solemn silence he sat on his knees. With his wings he patted down the dirt atop the grave, and with his tears he marked the headstone.
Ezekai looked to his sword, its shining blade now covered with dirt, and remembered the impulse he’d felt as the humans challenged him. The desire to prove them wrong. The desire to end their anger, pride, and hatred. The desire to kill.
“Help us, Ashhur,” Ezekai said, curling his body together, crumpling his bleeding hands into the loose earth of the grave beneath his chest. “Heavens help us, what are we becoming?”
Harruq stepped out into the private courtyard, still adjusting the straps of his armor. His swords swung wildly at his hips, the buckle not tightened correctly. Not that it mattered. He didn’t march into battle, just a spar, one he desperately, desperately needed.
“I was beginning to think you’d changed your mind,” Judarius said. An easy smile was on the angel’s face, his enormous mace resting across one shoulder. His eyes, a mixture of green and gold, sparkled.
“I’m killing Antonil the moment he gets back,” Harruq said, giving his belt a savage tug to tighten it. “Thought it might be best to confess that now, get it all out of the way.”
“Pressures of running a kingdom?”
“Pressures of running it badly. Careful with your swings, by the way. I’ve been told these flower pots are rather old.”
Judarius looked at the flowers, growing in vases of white marble, and then shrugged.
“I will do my best,” he said. “But if I must, I will replace them with vases of pearl and gold from Avlimar. Are you ready, half-orc?”
Harruq drew his swords, immediately feeling the tension in his muscles beginning to ease. Standing there with his blades in his hands made him think to his days training with Haern the Watcher. Back then he’d relied on strength alone, his fighting style the equivalent of a bull running someone over. He liked to think he was better now, and as Judarius raised his mace, Harruq wondered if Haern would be proud of him. It was a strange thought, a bitter remembrance, and it nearly cost him his first hit. Judarius’s mace swung in, almost lazy compared to what the mighty warrior was capable of. Harruq crossed his swords and blocked, letting out a grunt as he did.
“What’s that?” Judarius asked, stepping back and slamming the hilt of the mace toward Harruq’s gut. “Have you gotten fat already?”