Mark Newton: Retribution

Later, much later, as the sun reached its zenith, there was a sign from a small pocket of soldiers. A signal came down from a grassy hillside that they had caught several men.

About an hour later, these prisoners were being marched down the slope where they were forced to kneel in front of the large stone building, their hands on their heads, facing the wall.

Satisfied these prisoners were under control, two of the soldiers dressed in blue and black approached me.

‘Found them in a small shack on the other side of the island, sir,’ said a tall officer. ‘There’s a bigger operation down there — just the mineral, though. Rock processing. There’s a small jetty where the mineral is shipped from.’

‘Are there any documents? Is there any evidence?’

‘Burned.’

‘They must have seen our ship coming,’ I replied, ‘and tried to conceal what was here.’

‘Aye. They smell of fires, the lot of them. Most likely they burned these kids too so we couldn’t find them.’

‘Do you have any idea how long it takes to burn a body?’ I said. ‘Those children were burned before we turned up. It takes a lot more people to do it, too. No doubt there are more hiding on the island somewhere. Find them. Leave these ones here.’

‘Sir.’

The soldiers followed my orders. I nodded to Leana and we both walked around the front, facing the eight men, who were a range of ages. The youngest no more than twenty summers, the oldest in his fifties, and each looked well fed. Their faces had been blackened by soot, and their clothing was stained beyond recognition. They held their heads low.

Barely able to hide my anger at the lack of humanity, I eventually composed myself and addressed them all.

‘My name,’ I began, shouting loudly above the wind, ‘is Lucan Drakenfeld. I am an Officer of the Sun Chamber, the highest legal authority in the Vispasian Royal Union.’

I repeated the statement in Kotonese.

‘You are all to be arrested and taken back to the mainland. Your crimes, if you are found responsible, will lead to your execution. I cannot guarantee it will be a quick death. You are likely to be subjected to a painful and humiliating end.’

Again, I repeated myself in the other language.

‘I will take you one by one to the adjacent field where so many bodies lie in various states of decomposition. You will have the opportunity to prove your innocence. By explaining what has gone on here, and who is responsible, there is a slender opportunity for mercy. I am not an unreasonable man.’ I gave a brief pause. ‘However, my assistant here is not so kind.’ Leana drew her sword, the blade glimmering in the morning sun. ‘Should you be. . unhelpful in any way, I cannot guarantee any of the laws of this continent will be adhered to, nor that your pain will be minimal. Having seen what’s happened here, I can’t say I care all that much. The choice, gentlemen, is yours.’

I pointed at the oldest man in the group. The soldiers dragged him into the field indelicately before they kicked him in the ribs.

Another soldier brought forward my travel case, containing paper and ink, and followed me into the field. There I set up my operation and began the afternoon-long process to find out the truth of what had happened here on Evum.

The raw emotional state of these men meant that the answers came swiftly. Confessions were muttered through tear-soaked lips, the relief of their being caught all too clear.

I tried not to speculate on the morality of these men. I had seen people do strange things when enough coin could line their pockets. Standards could vanish in the blink of an eye when a group was left to establish its own rules, far removed from the guiding lines of common society. I was not here to judge, not yet, just looking for answers.

And they came soon enough.

Every month for decades, ever since the island had been in operation, children had been killed to please the ancient god Hymound, the ‘King of the Multitudes’. The cult out here was extreme, a faction based on a much older and debased form of the religion, one which thrived with less violent elements on the mainland. Those involved took their faith every bit as seriously as I did with Polla.

The cult was deeply connected to the land, and concerned itself with blood and renewal. Omens were to be found in the passage of birds. The weather was scrutinized for signs and animal entrails were studied assiduously. Entrails offered guidance — and out here human intestines were more reliable. The youngest member of our current cohort of prisoners was a former child labourer, and attributed his position of authority to his dedication to Hymound.

Throughout the painstaking interviews the men spoke with passion. There were outbursts amid the mumbled, often contradictory, pieces of evidence. When pressed on what Hymound offered them, the response was always the same. Immortality. The opportunity to endure.

A special child was burned ceremonially every month in the brass bull. Or, more specifically, they forced children to burn their kin . The chosen one’s ashes rose into the sky to be welcomed by Hymound — it was an honour, the captives claimed, and many children were glad to be relieved of their lives in the mines. As these offerings lived on in the heavens, it was assumed their sacrifice would hasten the discovery of more evum on the island.

Children were taken, over the years, out of the orphanages and brought on ships in the dead of night. Many of the men did not know who was responsible for acquiring or transporting the children — they just arrived — but I could guess who might be involved. It was even said that one of the wealthy donors offered up their own son in an effort to satisfy the gods so that they could be rewarded with their evum much sooner — such was their desperation, such was the difficulty in finding pockets of evum on this island.

The lengths people would go to in order to extend their lives.

I pushed for names. In the heat of the moment, I felt I had no reservations about inflicting any torture upon them — there was no civilization out here, and all my standard rules were irrelevant. However, the threat of Leana’s blade was enough with these dejected men.

The names came forth.

Lydia Marinus. Grendor of the Cape. Bishop Tahn Valin. The Kahn brothers. They had all been part of the scheme. They were all abusing children and using them for material and metaphysical gain. But there were far more names. Presumably the killers could not have known them all and had murdered those they could get to. Other individuals involved in this island’s despicable operation might have tried hard to keep their influence to a minimum. Either way these names would be issued to Sulma Tan and the queen. Their investigation would have to continue into the furthest reaches of their culture.

The operation existed to harvest the mineral known by several names. Evumite. Redstone. Bloodstone. Life-giver. There were local names, too. This, combined with some of the strange word-hybrids in their syntax, indicated that people had been isolated here for so long that their language had evolved. I had no doubt that those in charge of the operation would have gone to any lengths to keep the workers here for ever. It would have been too much of a risk to take them back to the mainland.

Evumite, they claimed, was able to extend life and grant special powers at times; when pressed on what these powers were, they could not say. As they spoke I wondered if such powers had been the reason why the bodies of those murdered on the mainland had stirred in some way — that there was still some strange form of life within them.

The precious mineral was available in incredibly rare quantities, located in isolated pockets buried deep underground. Very little ever made it to the mainland. Everyone who worked here, who was no longer a child, and who had proved themselves during five years of service, was permitted a small lump of evumite as payment for their trouble. A charitable gesture, the captives claimed. The longer those people served, the more evumite they might be given. The man I thought was in his fifties said he was eighty-four years old and had worked here since he was eleven.