Kharl could see the truth in what the other had said. But what could he do? “They don’t let anyone see you here?”
“You jesting? Won’t see anyone till you go before the justicer. That’d be Reynol, ’cause he hangs everyone, and that’s what they’ll want. Four sentences-that’s all they got. Flogging, time in the quarries, cut off a hand or foot or both, or hang you. You, they’ll hang. Don’t matter you did it or not.”
“You’re cheerful.” Kharl swallowed.
“Yep. Cheerful Kaj, that’s what they call me.”
“What about you? Why are you here?”
“Me? I called that pigswill Egen a bawdson.”
“For that, you’re in here?”
“Lucky to be alive. Egen’s Lord West’s youngest, captain in the Watch. Likes girls, young girls. Didn’t know he was watchin’…said he wasn’t man enough to handle a real woman. Whole tavern laughed. Didn’t say nothing. When I came out later, his men were waitin’…and here I am.”
Kharl had the sinking feeling that Egen and the young swell who’d attacked Sanyle and Jenevra were the same man. There were too many coincidences…far too many.
He could feel himself beginning to sweat, and with the nausea he was feeling intermittently, he wondered if he could hold his guts in.
“Egen…real pissprick…and his daddy just looks the other way…”
That didn’t surprise Kharl.
X
A day passed, and then another. Kharl thought it might have been three days since the fire, and since someone had killed Jenevra. That was if he’d only been knocked out for less than a day. He walked back and forth, if taking three small steps between walls could be called walking. He stopped and coughed, then walked some more.
“That won’t do any good,” observed Kaj from the corner of the cell-the opposite outside corner from the slop bucket.
“I know,” Kharl replied, “but I can’t just sit here.”
“Might as well. Not goin’ anywhere. Except dancin’ on air.”
“If it’s so important to hang me,” Kharl said, “why hasn’t anyone done anything?”
“You in a hurry to get strung up?” asked Kaj.
“No.”
“Then don’t ask for it.”
“But, I’d think…”
“Simple. They brought you in on sixday. Justicers and lords like long end-days. Lord West is gettin’ old. Needs the days off to keep his sons at bay. Today’s oneday, I figure. Takes a day for the scriveners to write up things formal like. Maybe longer. They don’t hurry once you’re locked away. They won’t come for you till tomorrow, earliest.”
“What about you?”
“Leave me here for another eightday. Drag me out and flog me, if I’m lucky…Egen’s still a pissprick.”
“Why doesn’t Lord West rein him in?”
“’Cause he’s a smart pissprick. Never gets caught. Always brings you in law-like. Me, drunk too much. Claimed I was soused and disorderly. Was lucky. He’d been really put out, and he’d a planted a lady’s brooch or somethin’ on me. That’s what he did to Fliser. Twice. Second time, they hung him.”
“Lord West knows that?”
“Knows some of it. Doesn’t care, I’d say. Older son, Osten, he’s more like his father. Rotten, but not all the way through like Egen. What they say anyway…”
Kharl wanted to shake his head. He’d always suspected those sorts of things happened, but when he’d suggested it to Charee, she’d have nothing to do with his suggestions. For her, all that mattered was that the streets were orderly, no matter how Lord West and his justicers got the job done.
“Not so bad as Gorl, though…”
Kharl was certain that he didn’t want to hear about Gorl, but there was no way to stop the garrulous Kaj, and he supposed, no reason to. All Kharl could do was to walk a few steps and fret, or sit and stew.
He tried not to breathe deeply as he walked back across the cell.
XI
Despite Kaj’s predictions, the gaolers did not come for Kharl until threeday, slightly before midmorning. They took a bucket and splashed water over his hands and face and let him dry both with a small rough towel. Then they bound his hands before him and marched him up the narrow stone staircase. He climbed three flights of steps with centers hollowed by years of wear before they reached a door that led out into the courtyard of the Justicers’ Hall. The sky was gray, threatening rain, but the stone pavement was dry. Kharl glanced at the gallows scaffold at the north end of the courtyard, and below it, the flogging frames.
How had it all come to pass? All he’d done was try to help two women and a neighbor, and he was going to be hanged for a killing he hadn’t done?
The unseasonably cool wind carried a sour odor to and around Kharl, a smell similar to rotting fish, even as he kept looking at the scaffold.
“You’ll be seeing that soon enough, fellow.” One of the gaoler’s armsmen said, yanking Kharl to start him across the courtyard toward the narrow door at the back of the Hall.
Kharl stumbled, then caught his balance, walking deliberately. The armsmen did not try to hurry him. When they reached the outer door, one stepped ahead and opened it. Inside, they guided Kharl along a narrow corridor that ended at another door, which the same armsman opened, and which led into a foyer. On the left side of the foyer was a single set of double doors, through which the three proceeded.
The chamber in which Kharl found himself was large, but not so large as the outside of the Justicers’ Hall would have suggested. The width was about thirty cubits, the length fifty, and the ceiling height was roughly ten. At the end of the chamber were two daises, one behind the other, each holding a podium desk of age-darkened white oak that had turned a deep brownish gold. At the seat behind the lower dais sat a round-faced, blocky, and gray-haired man with a square-cut gray beard who wore a blue velvet gown, trimmed in black.
The single seat on the upper dais, its high, carved back gilded and upholstered in blue velvet, was vacant.
Kharl and the two armsmen stopped beside a heavyset man in a blue-and-gold tunic, who looked to the armsmen. “You should have brought him sooner.” Then he lifted the heavy staff and rapped it on the stones of the floor three times, hard enough that the sound echoed through the chamber. All the murmurs died away. “All stand!”
Since Kharl was on his feet, he merely kept standing.
“Is there one who would take the Justicer’s Challenge?” intoned the bailiff, barely pausing before continuing. “There being none, the cooper Kharl is here, accused of murder, to be brought before justice!”
Kharl wondered what the Justicer’s Challenge was, and who might take it-or why-but no one said anything about it.
The man at the lower dais stood, his eyes fixing on the armsmen and Kharl.
“Bailiff,” intoned the justicer after he stood, “bring forth the cooper Kharl.”
“That’s you,” murmured one of the armsmen. “Step firm.”
Escorted by the two armsmen, Kharl walked to the armless chair set in the open space forward of the rows of benches. Standing before the benches to the right were several armsman and the Watch captain who had ordered Kharl taken. Before the benches to the left were Charee, Father Jorum, and Mallamet, the cooper whose shop was on Eighth Cross and Cargo Road.
“Keep standing,” whispered the armsman.
“You, the cooper Kharl, have been charged with the murder of the blackstaffer Jenevra. What you say or believe is not a question. We are here to do justice, and that justice is to determine whether you killed that blackstaffer.” The justicer cleared his throat, then seated himself.
From behind Kharl came a rap of the staff. “All may sit.”
“Sit down,” hissed the armsman.
Kharl sat, arms still bound before him. He looked at the justicer, but the man never seemed to look back at him.
“Justice calls upon Egen, captain of the Watch,” called the justicer.
The captain stood and stepped forward until he was but four paces back from the dais. He bowed. “Lord Justicer Reynol.”