Chris Wooding - Retribution Falls

Only a final twist of ill fortune had stopped him. Trinica had made copies of the charts he stole. Without the compass she couldn’t make it through the magnetic mines that guarded Retribution Falls, but she could wait at the point where she knew he’d emerge.

One little slip-up. But he’d led them a merry chase all the same. They might have caught him, but he still felt like he’d won.

He looked at the faces behind the bars: Malvery, Crake, Silo, Harkins . . . even Pinn. He was surprised to find he was sad to be leaving them. He didn’t want it all to end now. He’d just begun to enjoy himself.

Frey had stopped listening to the list of crimes and accusations that the judge was reading out. The preliminaries were unimportant. He was thinking only of what was to come. Death was inevitable. He accepted that, and was calm. His hands were tied securely before him, and there were two dozen guards with rifles waiting to fill him with bullets if he should try to escape.

But he still had one trick left to play. The world would remember him, alright. Maybe they’d never know the truth, but they’d know his name.

The judge, an ancient, short-sighted relic who was more than half dust, finished his rambling and looked up, adjusting his spectacles.

‘Sentence of death has been passed,’ he droned. ‘Tradition grants the prisoner the opportunity to make a last request. Does the prisoner have such a request?’

‘I do,’ said Frey. ‘To be honest, I consider it a bit of an insult that the Duke couldn’t even provide a decent gallows to hang me by. I request an alternative method of execution.’

Duke Grephen’s sallow face coloured angrily. Trinica watched the prisoner curiously with her black eyes.

‘I’d like to be beheaded with my own cutlass,’ Frey said.

The judge looked at the Duke. Grephen swiped a strand of lank blond hair from his forehead and huffed.

‘I can see no objection,’ creaked the judge warily, in case the Duke had any objection.

‘Fetch his cutlass!’ Grephen cried. One of the guards hastened away to obey.

Frey stared at the Duke coolly. Even in his uniform, he looked like a spoiled boy. His deeply set eyes glittered with childish spite. He was a cold and humourless man, Frey surmised that much. He’d murdered dozens on board the Ace of Skulls, just to kill the Archduke’s son in such a way that it could be pinned on someone else. Frey didn’t believe it bothered him one bit. If there was any warmth in him, it was reserved for the Allsoul.

Next to him stood Gallian Thade. Sharp-faced, beak-nosed, with a pointed black beard. He was all angles and edges, where the Duke was soft and pudgy. Thade watched him with an air of smugness. He’d waited a long time to see the man who had deflowered his daughter receive his punishment.

And then there was Trinica. He couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Her ghost-white face revealed nothing. Would she be pleased to see him die? Would she finally be able to close the chapter of her life that had begun with him? Or was she even now remembering fonder moments from their past, wondering if she’d done the right thing in bringing him here?

Grephen had destroyed the Ace of Skulls; Thade had picked Frey to frame for it; Trinica had caught him.

He had reason to kill them all. But he’d only have time to do one of them. And he’d already chosen his target.

The guard returned from the barracks with his cutlass. Grephen took it and inspected it before passing it to the executioner. The executioner ran his thumb admiringly down the blade, then hissed through his teeth as he slashed the tip open.

‘Could you get this thing off me?’ Frey asked, jiggling his shoulders to indicate the noose. The executioner thrust the cutlass into his belt and removed the noose with one hand, sucking his bleeding thumb with the other.

‘Kneel down, mate,’ he said. Frey went to his knees on the wooden platform at the foot of the lamp-post. He shifted his wrists inside their knots of rope and rolled his neck.

He looked over at the cage, where his crew were imprisoned. Once he was dead, they’d follow him. Pinn seemed bewildered. Crake’s gaze was heavy with tragedy. Silo was inscrutable, Harkins was cringing in a corner and looking away. Malvery gave him a rueful smile and a thumbs-up. Frey nodded in silent thanks for his support.

‘Sentence of execution by beheading,’ said the judge, ‘to be carried out in the sight of these eminent witnesses.’

The executioner drew the cutlass and took aim, touching the blade to the back of Frey’s neck. ‘Don’t worry, eh?’ he said. ‘One swipe and it’ll be done.’

Frey took a breath. One swipe. He saw the blade descending in his mind’s eye. He saw himself dropping one shoulder, rolling, holding up his hands as the daemon-thralled sword slashed neatly through his bonds. He saw the blade jump from the hands of the executioner and into Frey’s grasp. He saw the surprise on Grephen’s face as Frey flung it from the podium. He saw it slide point first into the Duke’s fat heart.

The sword always knew his will. He might go down in a hail of bullets, but the author of his misery would go down with him. And all of Vardia would know how Duke Grephen died at the hands of an insignificant little freebooter, who had outwitted him at the last.

‘Kill him,’ said Grephen to the executioner.

The executioner raised the cutlass. Frey closed his eyes.

Ready . . .

The blade quivered, and he fancied he heard the harmonic singing of the daemon within.

Ready . . .

And then a loud voice cried: ‘STOP!’

The voice that had halted the execution belonged to Kedmund Drave, the most feared of the Century Knights, who Frey had last seen lying on a landing pad in Tarlock Cove after he emptied a shotgun into Drave’s chest. His moulded crimson armour showed no signs of the encounter as he swept across the courtyard towards Duke Grephen, his thick black cape swaying around him.

To either side were Samandra Bree and Colden Grudge. Frey recognised them from their ferrotypes. Samandra was wearing the outfit she was famous for: battered coat and boots, loose hide trousers, a tricorn hat perched on her head. Grudge, in contrast, looked like something half-ape. Shaggy-haired and bristle-faced, he was a hulking mass of dirty armour barely contained inside the folds of a hooded cloak. His autocannon clanked against his back. It was a gun bigger than most men could even carry, let alone fire.

‘What exactly is going on here?’ Drave demanded, striding up to the Duke. They could scarcely have been more different: the soft, spoiled aristocrat in his neatly pressed uniform and the iron-hard figure of the Knight, his silver-grey hair shorn close to his scalp and his cheek and neck horribly scarred.

Grephen collected himself, overcame the physical intimidation and attempted to assert his Ducal authority. ‘These men are pirates,’ he said. ‘They have been condemned to death. I wasn’t aware there was any law forbidding a Duke to deal with pirates inside his own duchy. As you can see, I have a judge here to ensure everything is legal.’

Drave stared at the old judge, who began to look nervous.

‘I see,’ he said slowly. ‘I imagine the trial has been thorough and fair.’

Grephen bristled. ‘Remember who you’re talking to, sir. You may have the Archduke’s authority but even the Archduke knows to respect his Dukes.’

‘I’m not in the business of respect,’ Drave snarled. He turned to the judge. ‘There has been a trial, I assume?’

The judge looked shiftily at Grephen and swallowed. ‘I was brought here to oversee the executions. The Duke assured me that their guilt was not in question.’