Chapter Twenty-Four #2
I glanced at the Guardians whose hands twitched around the weapons slung at their hips.
Their eyes darted from Cosmo to the table and back again, clearly weighing their options, already considering stepping in to circumvent justice.
What had he told him before this trial? What orders had they been given?
Would they declare martial law and use a show of force against the crowd to bully the Tribunal into deciding upon a fate that suited the head of the snakes?
Or would they enforce whatever justice the Tribunal doled out without regard to whomever was on the receiving end of it?
Looking into their suspicious expressions, I thought I might know the answer.
“Call the witnesses, Madam Avus,” Jude’s calm voice somehow rang out above the crowd.
All eyes turned to find him seated patiently in his chair, having not moved an inch during the commotion.
His eyes were narrowed and set firmly upon Cosmo and he had one leg crossed over the other in a posture which, in any other setting, might be called casual.
His composure brought a hush over the throng once more so that Nascha could speak again.
“Bernard Wagner,” Nascha announced with a dip of her chin, “please step forward.”
A shaking Decker moved out from the line of witnesses arranged on the outer wall, close to the tunnel.
His eyes were as round as saucers as they landed on the Viper Patriarch and suffered a lazy examination.
Cosmo looked him over once, curled his lip in disgust, and glanced away as if the boy were no more than a speck of dust on his mantle.
As if the witness didn’t have the power to see him executed on this Deck the same way he’d executed the Culled’s brother only weeks ago.
“Please inform the council of your experiences the morning of the Culling up to and during the event in question,” Nascha spoke gently, her ancient lips pulling up into a warm, matronly smile.
But Bernard glanced once at Cosmo and I knew what he would do before he did it.
“I wasn’t there, Madam Avus,” he announced, his voice far sturdier than his hands which shook violently at his sides. “I had a shift up on the Third that morning in the smelter.”
Nascha’s smile slid from her lips as her gaze darted to Cosmo. The Viper Patriarch didn’t move a muscle but the corners of his lips twitched upward in the barest hint of a grin.
“He’s gotten to them,” I muttered under my breath.
“Son of a bitch,” Milo hissed beside me.
“Thank you, Bernard,” Nascha replied, tone strained. “That will be all.”
“Arrest him for perjury,” Paxon snapped quietly. “He just lied to the Tribunal.”
“Arrest him with what enforcement?” Milo grumbled back. “No, we’ve gone about this all wrong. We’ve underestimated him again.”
Nascha called forward the next witness; Hanna Meyer. To no one’s surprise, it was soon discovered that Hanna hadn’t been at the Culling that morning. She’d been asleep, having stayed up too late the night before with a friend.
On and on it went. Each of Nascha and Raghnall’s witnesses stepped forward to announce they hadn’t been at the Culling after all, nor did they have any knowledge of the events which allegedly took place there.
They all glanced nervously at Cosmo and fled from the Tribunal the moment they were dismissed.
By the time we were halfway through the list of witnesses, the crowd began to understand what was happening.
Their whispers grew to murmurs as the accusations passed between each and every one of them.
Cosmo was bribing or intimidating witnesses.
Cosmo was destroying the case against him without saying a word.
Cosmo was stronger than the whole gathered Tribunal, cleverer, more powerful.
“Harrison Fletcher,” Nascha’s voice rang out once more and my eyes snapped up to lock on Harrison as he stepped forward out of the line of witnesses who remained. Only three of them left. The other two kept their eyes on their feet as Harrison strode up to face the council.
I couldn’t breathe.
“Harrison Fletcher, Third Ringer, have you come to tell us you were nowhere near the Culling that day or have any recollection of the atrocities this council has accused the Patriarch of House Viper of committing?”
“Unfortunately, Madam Avus, it appears I have a backbone,” Harrison replied in a flat tone.
A few gasps arose from around us. Paxon’s lips parted in surprise as Milo raised a hand to cover his mouth and watched on, intent. Cosmo’s gaze snapped to Harrison and narrowed into a glare of pure hatred as Myrine and the Guardians tensed at his back.
“In that case,” Nascha spoke carefully, slowly, knowing this was the only chance to hear from a witness that she might get, “please tell us what you saw that day.”
“Happily. I saw a frightened boy cowering with his mother until he was pulled away and tossed to the will of the priests. I saw his brother weeping as they pushed him forward. I saw him nod to the others in a show of support. I saw them all stand firm, together, and refuse to enter the twelfth tunnel. I saw Cosmo of House Viper arrive and start screaming at them about the gods’ will.
I heard him ask the priests why the tunnel wasn’t forcing them to enter and the priests stumble over their explanations.
Then I heard him say that if the twelfth wouldn’t force them in, he would.
I watched him take the sword from his daughter’s belt, raise it high in the air, and bring it down upon the neck of a weeping fifteen-year-old boy. ”
He paused and the air seemed to thicken. The crowd held a collective breath as Harrison turned to offer Cosmo a glare I thought might burn straight through him.
“I saw his head roll across the Deck,” he continued, punctuating every word with a snarl ripped straight from his heart.
“I saw his mother collapse, his brother disappear, and a family destroyed before my very eyes. I saw the Patriarch of House Viper wipe his daughter’s blade on his pants, hand it to her, and walk away.
I saw the members of the other Houses appear and condemn his actions while the blood of an innocent dyed the cobblestones red.
I picked up that mother. I helped her to her feet and back up to her home on the Third.
I stayed with her all night. I wiped her tears and held her hand and watched as our ring fell apart, once again, because of the actions of a man with too much power. ”
Shocked murmurs broke out at that. I watched those nearest me gasp and whisper behind their hands and my gaze narrowed at Harrison. What was he doing? What was he saying?
“It is the will of the gods that the Culled should go to their service,” Cosmo drawled a moment later, seemingly unaffected by Harrison’s impassioned recounting of events. “Should one intend to circumvent the will of the gods, it is our duty to steer them forward in the proper direction.”
“We are not finished with the witness, Sir Viper,” Raghnall bit out.
“Am I not to have a chance to refute the boy’s tale?” Cosmo asked, placing a hand on his chest and feigning offense. “Am I to stand here and allow his lies, allow him to dramatize the events and sully my good name? Is this a trial or a witchhunt?”
More gasps arose and the crowd was muttering so loudly now that Raghnall had to smack his fist on the table to quiet them.
“You will get a chance to mount your defense,” Nascha announced, keeping her emotions on a tight leash as she projected cool confidence, “as soon as we’ve finished hearing from the witnesses.”
“Witness,” Cosmo corrected. “You only seem to have one who brings forward any sort of accusation against me. One whom I’ve verbally sparred with in the past, and publicly.
It’s no secret that this boy harbors no affection for me or for any of my peers in the First Ring either.
Just listen to the way he speaks of his ring ‘falling apart, yet again’ by someone he deems too powerful.
He despises us and everything we have above him.
That hatred, or envy as it is, comes out in his speech whether he intends it to or not. ”
Muttering turned to outright talking as the crowd debated which side they were on. I saw more than one dubious glance cast toward Harrison and the Tribunal and had to reign myself in to keep from shouting at the top of my lungs how very idiotic they all were.
“We are chosen by the gods to lead,” Cosmo continued, turning on his box so he faced the crowd.
“Our families are blessed for their strength in body, mind, and spirit with the opportunity to lead others into the light. Despite our latest successes in the gods' Trials, despite the recent growth of our Cullings, despite all evidence that the gods are back and intervening once more in our lives, this boy and those like him spit in the face of the divine. He challenges the priests, the Houses, and the gods. He speaks of misplaced power with the intent to take that power for himself. He’s nothing but a dangerous heretic waiting for his chance for insurgency.”
“Liar,” Harrison hissed. “I saw you kill that boy. That’s all that matters, Viper. That’s why we’re here.”
“Is it? Take off your shirt.”
I blinked, caught off guard and certain I hadn’t heard him correctly. Beside me, Milo’s brows furrowed in confusion to match my own and Paxon murmured something to him I couldn’t hear. The whispers were back but I turned toward Harrison who’d gone entirely still, jaw locked and muscles frozen.
“What is the meaning of this, Cosmo?” Raghnall barked out impatiently.
“If the witness would comply, I do believe it’s vital for my defense,” Cosmo drawled, glancing lazily over to the Lynx Patriarch.
Raghnall sighed loudly.
“Very well,” he said. “Off with the shirt, boy.”
Harrison didn’t move. He just stood as still as stone, glaring at Cosmo as if he were only seconds away from darting across the Deck and throttling him with his bare hands.
Normally, I’d be elated to see it, but something felt off in that moment.
Something felt wrong. Why wasn’t he moving?
He’d been given a direct order from the Tribunal and a simple one at that, yet he wasn’t complying.
Raghnall’s expression shifted from bored to suspicious along with the rest of the crowd as the Patriarch of Lynx leaned forward in his chair and repeated his request.
“The shirt, boy,” he said. “Take it off.”
Harrison’s jaw worked for a moment before he reached for the hem of his grey cotton tee shirt. In one fluid motion, he pulled it up and over his head.
Time stood still as I stared, along with several hundred other pairs of eyes, at the massive tattoo stretching across his lean muscled back of three interlocking rings with a spiderweb upon them.
That’s when the arch of the twelfth tunnel exploded.