The hall, which had been silent, broke out into whispers.
Fagirra’s lips quivered slightly. It seemed to Egert that he was about to smile. “Well. Daughterly affections are commendable, but they do not justify the deaths of hundreds of people!”
Egert felt Toria flinch as she tried to overcome her pain and fear.
“Those people were killed by you. You hooded executioners! And now you weep over your victims?! On the night the Plague appeared”—Toria turned toward the hall—“on that very night—”
“Save your breath! Answer the questions without superfluous words,” Fagirra interrupted her. “On that very night, you and your father performed certain magics in his locked study. Yes or no?”
Egert realized how terrified she was. Fagirra stood next to her, piercing her bloodshot eyes with his gaze.
Toria staggered under his aggression. “Yes. But…”
With a sweeping, eloquent gesture, Fagirra turned to the magistrate, then to the hall. “Hundreds of candles burned all night in the dean’s study. Your loved ones were still alive. In the morning, dogs howled throughout the entire city, and your loved ones were still alive, but then the Plague descended, called forth by these conjurers.”
“A lie!” Toria wanted to shout, but her voice broke. She glanced at Egert, pleading for help, and he saw how her hope died.
“A lie…,” echoed from the corner where the students lurked. The crowd grumbled so loudly that the clerk banged on his table and the guards held up their pikes.
Encouraged by this unexpected support, Toria regained control of her temper. Egert felt how a desire broke through the black pall that shrouded her mind: a furious desire to resist, to denounce.
“It’s a lie that the Plague came through the will of my father. It was the Order of Lash that summoned death to us. They went to the hill where the victims of the plague were buried and dug it up! They let death go free!”
The crowd hummed loudly. Egert held his breath: he thought that the truth said loud enough was capable of changing the court’s direction.
“Did you see this yourself?” asked Fagirra.
“Yes!”
“But where?”
“In the enchanted—” Toria stopped and then ended the sentence in a hoarse voice. “—in the enchanted mirror … in the water…”
“In the water,” repeated Fagirra turning to the crowd, chuckling. “I’m sure that that’s not the only thing the mage can show ‘in the water.’”
There was an nervous laugh in the hall.
“Listen!” Toria gathered the last bits of her strength. “The Order of Lash is strong where everyone is afraid! Where people wait for the End of Time! The Order of Lash committed a crime to regain its former power! Has anyone ever seen the Lash facilitators bring people anything but fear? Who among you knows what the Order of Lash really is? Who among you knows what plans they nurture under their hoods? And who among you would not affirm that my father never brought evil to anyone in his whole life? Can even one of you ever recall him harming so much as a dog? With the help of magic or without it, he served at the university for decades. He worked for the good, and he is the one who saved all of you from the Plague. He sheltered us with his own body. He gave up his life, and now—”
Toria reeled from a sudden, resurgent pain; the tortures she had endured had left a multitude of agonizing marks on her body. Egert bit his hand, drawing blood. The crowd buzzed deafeningly. Astonished people repeated to each other the words of the accused, conveying them to the square, and it is possible that her words sowed doubt in some souls. The students stood strong, a fortress, a citadel of support for Toria. From the corner of his eye, Egert noticed the headmaster being buffeted toward the exit, holding on to his heart.
Fagirra was unfazed. With the corners of his pale mouth slightly raised, he uttered in a low voice, “You aggravate your guilt by slandering Lash.”
It was agonizingly hard for Toria to start speaking again. “You have not brought one piece of hard evidence of the guilt of my father. Everything you’ve said means nothing. You have neither evidence, nor … witnesses.”
She spoke ever softer and softer. Trying to make out her words, the crowd hushed, and only the scraping of soles along the floor and the breath of hundreds of people could be heard in the sultry air of the hall.
Fagirra smiled slightly. “There is a witness.”
Toria wanted to say something. She jerked her head up, ready to vent all her wrath and disdain on Fagirra, but then she stopped short and said nothing. Egert felt how all her strength and all her will dissolved, receding like water through open fingers. Hope, which had lingered on until this moment and which had helped her to struggle, shimmered one last time and then died. In the growing silence Toria turned her head and met Egert’s eyes.
He sat alone on an infinitely long bench, hunched over, doomed to betray. A wistful question stood in Toria’s eyes, but Egert could not answer it. They looked at each other for several seconds, and he felt how pity, despair, and contempt for his weakness struggled in her soul, but then these feeling gave way to a deathly exhaustion. Toria’s shoulders slowly slumped and, dragging her feet, she returned to the dock without a single word.
The silence in the hall lasted for a few more seconds; then a roaring quickly surged, flying up toward the ceiling. The clerk was about to pound on his table, but with a scarcely noticeable gesture Fagirra stopped him, and the hall, unrepressed, was free to express its astonishment, its indignation and its rage toward the sorceress who had capitulated in the face of overwhelming evidence.
Finally, Fagirra snapped his fingers, the clerk banged away at the tabletop, and the guards slammed the ends of their pikes on the floor. The crowd quieted, though not immediately. The magistrate said something Egert could not hear. The clerk loudly repeated his words, but these words did not reach Egert, who had settled into a dreary stupor, until a guard standing behind him firmly seized him by the elbow and lifted him up off the bench.
He looked around like a frightened dog. Fagirra watched him from under his hood, and in his eyes stood a benevolent and at the same time imperious command.
Egert did not remember how he got to the stand.
There, beyond the walls, the sun was shining, and two of its rays fell in through the two tall grilled windows. In their corner the students, who had grown despondent, brightened. Egert heard his name repeated many times: it was repeated excitedly, loudly, and softly; it was repeated indifferently, with surprise, with joy and hope. Those who had shared room and board with Egert for many days, those who had sat next to him in lectures and had drunk wine with him in merry taverns, those who knew of the planned wedding were justified in expecting from him words appropriate to an honest man.
The executioner sighed again, trying to wipe a dark spot from his bag; the pliers clinked softly and Egert felt the first jolt of eternal, animal fear.
Toria was looking to the side, as before slumped over, harassed and passionless.
“Here is the prosecutor’s main witness,” said Fagirra pompously. “This man’s name is Egert Soll. Lately he has been received in the dean’s study and he has been close to the dean’s daughter, which is why his testimony is so important to us. On that fateful night he was present during the accursed sorceries. We are listening to you, Soll.”
A deadly, unnatural silence spread over the entire world. The two windows watched Egert, like two empty, perfectly clear eyes. He remained silent. Dust motes danced in the columns of light, and Toria, frozen on her own bench, suddenly raised her head.