Kate Elliott - An earthly crown

At the door, a pack of jaran soldiers appeared, and they quickly entered the room under the command of an expressive young man and moved out to take control of the hall, to drag the prisoners aside, to move the heavy tables off the dais, to thoroughly search every man in the room save those of Charles's party.

And when that was all accomplished, Bakhtiian said something more. One by one the original guards came forward, all but the two who had stood on the dais, and each man laid his saber at Bakhtiian's feet, disarming himself. The intensity of their shame was painful to watch.

"Goddess Above," whispered David, "must it be done so publicly?'' Had he remembered that Ursula was standing there, he would not have said it aloud.

"Of course it must be done publicly. It's a lesson for everyone." The dishonored guards filed from the hall. "What do you think he'll do to the prisoners?" She sounded breathlessly excited. Aroused, even, David thought with a shudder. "And to those terrified townsmen?"

Marco slipped back beside them, no longer needed at the front. "Now we're about to see what justice means to the conquered," he whispered. They waited. Bakhtiian waited. The silence stretched out until it was a visceral thing, agonizing to endure.

One of the townspeople finally found enough courage to rise to his knees. "Please believe," he stammered, "that we knew nothing of this."

Bakhtiian glanced at him as if at an afterthought. ' 'I assume, Baron," he said in a cold voice, "that you have laws by which you judge such cases here."

"Of course! Of course!" Their fear was almost as humiliating to see as their desperate attempt at appeasement. "The punishment for treason is death."

"Then by your own laws shall they be judged." He lifted his chin, and the prisoners were led away.

"The sentence shall be carried out at once," said the baron, and he snapped an order to a younger man, who hurried out of the hall on the heels of the prisoners. A richly-dressed old woman wept noisily in the corner.

Bakhtiian found his chair and sat down in it. He looked at Charles. Charles raised one eyebrow and sat down next to him. Cara remained standing behind Charles, but she did not touch him, although David could tell she wanted to. Her hand hovered over his shoulder, veered toward his sleeve, and settled, twitching, at her waist.

"Sit!" said Bakhtiian impatiently to the barons and elders. "You said you had other cases you wished to bring before me."

David realized that his rump hurt, from sitting so still, from being so tensed up. Maggie crept over to them and Marco put an arm around her. She was so white that her freckles stood out like blazons. The actors had crept out from under their table and they stood in a tableau, clutching one another. Not one eye left Bakhtiian for more than a second, except perhaps for Charles, who looked thoughtful and not at all cowed. None of them dared move as, one by one, prisoners were led in, their crimes recited aloud, and Bakhtiian begged to judge and sentence each one.

But in every case he deferred to the elders of the town, to their own laws, and placed the judgment squarely back on them according to their own customs. Despite himself, David was impressed by Bakhtiian's restraint. Especially since some of their own people had just tried to murder him.

Last of all an unremarkable young man was brought forward. He had a big nose, rheumy eyes, and he looked young and frightened. The baron sighed and relaxed, as if he knew the worst was over.

"This young man is accused by Merchant Flayne of raping his daughter, and although the usual punishment is that he must marry the girl, he's but an apprentice in a neighboring shop, and she was out walking at night by herself, and there is another merchant who has agreed to marry her despite-" He broke off because Bakhtiian stood up.

Stood up and took the three steps down to the accused with deliberate slowness. Glass rasped under his boots. Faced with Bakhtiian's devastating stare, the accused dropped to his knees, clasped his hands together, and began to plead in the local dialect.

"And is it true?" asked Bakhtiian in a voice so soft that David could barely hear him. "Did he force her?"

"He has confessed to the deed. It's the sentence that concerns us-"

Bakhtiian drew his saber and killed the young man.

Cut him through the throat so quickly that it was done before anyone realized he meant to do it.

Charles stood up, right up out of his chair. Bakhtiian stared at the corpse and took a step up to avoid the pool of blood growing, flooding broken bits of glass and plate on the floor. He flicked a glance back at the dais. Slowly, slowly, Charles sat down. One of the actresses gave a great shriek and fainted. Bile swelled in David's throat, and he clapped a hand to his mouth and fought against it, gulping, feeling it poison his tongue and burn his lips.

"David," whispered Marco, and David felt Marco's hand press into his back. "Breathe slowly. Breathe slowly."

Bakhtiian turned to regard the baron. "Is there anyone else?"

The baron could not speak for a long while. He held one hand to his breast, and his eyes bugged out, staring. "None, lord," he stuttered. "No more." No more to be judged, did he mean? Or was it a plea for no more of this harsh and merciless justice? That was no justice at all, no law, but only the tyrant's whim.

Bakhtiian turned to look at Charles. "Will you accompany me?" he asked, and David could not tell if it was a request or an order.

"I'd better wait for my own people, who are a trifle discomposed," said Charles. How could he remain so self-possessed? The calm mask he wore for an expression only added to David's dismay.

"He's cool," muttered Maggie.

"Oh, come now, what did you expect?" hissed Ursula with disgust. "Frankly, I think it was a just execution."

Bakhtiian inclined his head, to acknowledge Charles's decision. "Then if you will excuse me," he said, distinctly to Charles, not to anyone else. He swept from the hall, his guards behind him. The young man named Aleksi lingered behind, and David saw him slip a folded piece of parchment into Charles's hands. Then he, too, was gone, and they were left with the weeping actors, the shell-shocked townsfolk, and the dead man.

They huddled together in the common room of the inn they shared. None of them wanted to be there, but neither did they want to go up to their filthy rooms. Owen stared at the fire, and Diana just knew that he was playing the awful scene back through his mind, gleaning ideas from it that he would eventually turn around and use in the theater.

"Cold-blooded bastard," muttered Hal beside her. "Mom's no damn better. Look at her." Ginny sat next to Owen. For the journey, she had given up her slatepad and taken up a real paper notebook, but the result was the same: she jotted down notes and revised scenes in every spare second given to her.

Anahita lay prostrate on a bench, moaning softly. Hyacinth fanned her, and Phillippe massaged her feet. Se-shat and Dejhuti sat off by themselves, and Helen and Jean-Pierre argued about how best to take the wine stain out of his white linen tunic. Joseph sat with one arm around Oriana and the other around Quinn, talking quietly to them. Yomi just watched over them all.

"What do you think, Gwyn?" Hal asked Gwyn Jones.

Gwyn appeared to ponder the question, but Diana could see right away that he didn't care what Hal thought of the cavalier reaction of his parents to that horrible scene. "I think I've never seen someone handle a sword that well," he said softly. "That young man is an artist."

Hal rolled his eyes in disgust, heaved himself to his feet, and went over to sit beside Quinn.

"I think he expected sympathy," said Diana.

Gwyn shrugged. "Di, I can't change what happened. Why dwell on it?"