“Highness,” said Tyrel, “these two are dead.” Pointing to the old man and the woman. Sure enough, Sofy saw their limbs and fingers were stiff. “The girl still lives. I cannot say about the child.”
What possible reason could anyone have for doing this to a child, Sofy wondered. Children had sometimes died in Lenay wars but, as Yasmyn said, those were deaths in hot blood, fuelled by ancient regional hatreds and motivated by the urge to destroy a blood enemy’s line. Those killings, however horrible, were quick. This was planned and calculating. Whoever had done this wished these four to suffer.
And why in the world was she still standing around wondering what to do about it? Jaryd never would have. Jaryd would have cut them down in a flash.
“Captain, take them down.”
“Aye, Highness,” said Tyrel, and his men moved quickly. None of the guardsmen seemed interested in disputing the order.
“Your Highness,” said Willem, “I’m really not so sure that’s wise…” Sofy ignored him, staring up at the girl Tyrel had insisted was alive. She looked lifeless to Sofy, but the captain was surely more practised in telling life from death than she. “Highness, these are clearly people guilty of some evil crime; the local people have every right to enforce their own justice in any way they-”
“They can argue with me once I’m queen,” Sofy said coldly. “And just pray that I’ll be as merciful.”
The girl’s cage came down with a clang, then the child’s. The clamps that held both halves together were released, and guardsmen carefully lowered girl and child to the pavings. Each stank, and were limp, scrawny and filthy. The girl had a rope tied about her neck and between her teeth as a gag. Sofy guessed the townsfolk did not wish to listen to her sobbing while they prayed. She wondered how many days a person could sob for, fearing all the time, while thirsting, hungering and cramping, unable to so much as scratch an itch.
Guardsmen tried to pour each some water from their flasks. The child did not respond. “There is a pulse,” Corporal Heyar said, feeling at the child’s slim neck, listening close for a breath. “Very faint. Unsteady. This one will die unless we get some food into the child.”
The girl gasped. Captain Tyrel patted her face, and sunken eyes fluttered open, beneath a fringe of straggly brown hair. “You’re safe, child,” said Tyrel, in Torovan. “Have some water.” The girl sipped, desperately. And coughed.
“That’s not right,” a guardsman was muttering. Stoic and disciplined, Sofy hadn’t known her guards to voice personal opinions. “Someone should be paying for this, this ain’t right.”
There were terrible sores on the girl’s arms, where her limbs had been stuck, pressing for days against the metal. Weeks maybe, Willem had said. Then the temple bell began to clang. Sofy stared, and saw the pulley rope, leading somewhere inside, jerking it back and forward.
“Your Highness,” Willem said with exasperation, “I was afraid something like this would happen. We’ve been seen, now there will be trouble.”
“Get them up,” Tyrel ordered his men. “We can’t help them here anyhow, they need medicines before they can eat.”
Up the town road, doors were opening, and villagers were emerging into the rain. Some were armed. Most came running. Sofy’s concern mounted to alarm. Willem seemed almost frantic. “Your Highness, we must go now!”
“We’re not running anywhere!” Sofy retorted. Even she knew how stupid that would be, tactically. “Captain!”
“Put them down!” Tyrel revised his last order. “We’ll see off this mob first, we can’t spare the hands. Highness, M’Lady, Master Willem, behind me if you please!”
The guardsmen fanned out fast, weapons drawn and shields unslung from their backs. Yasmyn pulled Sofy between herself and Willem, and from her belt pulled her darak. Heavy, curved and nearly the length of Sofy’s forearm, it glinted dully in the dim light. Captain Tyrel had left the lanterns on the pavings beside the girl and child-Sofy scampered to pick one up and rejoin Yasmyn.
There were nearly fifty villagers, Sofy guessed, and even now, more came running. Most were men, perhaps half with weapons. Up the road behind, many women stood in doorways, clutching children as dogs barked and villagers shouted to each other in Algrassian. Still the bell clanged, summoning the town.
The temple doors opened as the crowd gathered, clustering four paces beyond the bare steel of the Royal Guard. A priest emerged, gaunt and balding, in a black robe. He stood on the stairs, eyes wide in alarm and fear. Still the bell clanged. So there were others in there.
The priest began shouting to the mob in Algrassian. Angry and fearful villagers looked at each other, then circled to see where two of the devil’s fruit had been lowered and sprung open. Two guardsmen stepped away from the main formation, walking sideways to stay between those villagers and Sofy. Despite her thumping heart, Sofy was surprised to discover she was not terrified. Royal Guardsmen were amongst the most formidable warriors in Lenayin, and even six or seven to one, against common Bacosh villagers, would not trouble them. But more than that, she knew she was in the right. This predicament was neither her fault nor her mistake. Astonishing to realise that that simple fact alone dispelled half the fear.
She spared a glance at Yasmyn, and found her slightly crouched, her loose dress pulled up a little at the knees, darak held low and ready. Her eyes were eager, as though she wished the villagers to attack. Knowing Yasmyn, and the Isfayen in general, Sofy was hardly surprised.
Angry shouts began amongst the villagers as the priest finished speaking. Weapons were waved, dangerously. Sofy found herself more mesmerised by the guardsmen’s swords. Huge, gleaming silver and wickedly sharp, it seemed unthinkable that someone might actually use them to strike another person.
“What’s he saying?” Sofy demanded furiously to Willem of the priest.
“He…he says that you have desecrated a holy site…I…I can’t make out the rest…”
“You’re Algrassian!” Sofy retorted incredulously. “Don’t you know your own tongue?”
“The accent is very strong!” Willem protested, with moisture on his face that was not from the rain.
“Do something! Tell them who we are!”
“Your Highness, I don’t think that will help!”
“Do it! That’s an order!”
Willem shouted for attention, arms raised high. The crowd of villagers quieted a little. Willem continued, anxiously in Algrassian. When he finished, there was uproar. Willem looked at Sofy, and she could see “I told you so” in his eyes. An axe was thrown from the crowd, a guardsman leaping to interpose himself, taking the blow on his shield. Sofy was more astonished than frightened. She’d known Lenayin was poorly regarded in the Bacosh, but mostly, she’d thought the attitude one of disdain. This seemed like hatred.
Villagers moved wide, trying to flank the guardsmen’s lines, the eight soldiers spreading sideways…they could not maintain a defensive perimeter about both her and the two unfortunates lying on the pavings, she realised. If the villagers waited until they were entirely encircled…but the thought vanished as several from the mob darted forward to attack. Sofy was nearly relieved.
One swung an axe at a guardsman, who fended with his shield. His fellow guardsman performed a simple overhead, his blade splitting the axeman through shoulder to midchest. Blood erupted in all directions, and the body hit the pavings like a slaughtered carcass. Another attacker lost his arm, fell to his knees screaming, then lost his head. To Sofy’s right, a guardsman who was rushed by three at once knocked one off his feet with a shield charge, and hacked the second through the side. The third rushed past, a short sword in hand, but Yasmyn leaped into his path, slid inside his blade with a deflecting arm, and took the full impact of his rushing body. It knocked her back several steps, but then the man was falling, sliding from her arms, his guts spilling on the pavings where Yasmyn’s darak had split his middle. Yasmyn danced back, her blade and right hand bloody, and hissed at the corpse with what sounded like pleasure.