Chapter 24
Careful Half-Truths
“Mr. Bane." Otto Bittenbinder, the sneering arbiter of this sham of a trial, leaned forward in his throne-like chair upon the dais. The Master Memnomancer’s sharp gaze dissected Malachy, seated in the lone chair below the Tribunal’s sickle of unfriendly faces.
"Be advised that execution is the most charitable outcome given your long list of crimes.”
For the second time in one year, Malachy found himself trapped within stone walls at the bottom of a flooded Roman quarry.
Summer sunshine filtered through the leagues of water above, bathing the travertine compound below in shimmering ripples of light.
Only the Master Aeromancer’s enchantment, domed like a thick pane of glass overhead, kept the air in and the water out.
Yet water still trickled inside, as if the milky stone had absorbed its prisoner’s tears and wept them back, drop by drop, to pool like mirrors in the grooves worn by the heavy steps of Masters.
Malachy had been ready when the Tribunal came to arrest him; Cora had not.
Too many dead bodies had piled up to hide them, and Lt.
Potts’s disappearance was the final nail in the coffin of Malachy’s innocence.
Once the Master Necromancer had confirmed the lieutenant’s death, the Tribunal had sent Inez Rojas, the Master Ferromancer herself, to escort Malachy in chains forged by her metal magic.
Cora had looked on as they dragged him away, tears swimming in her eyes. A foretaste of regret.
“Where shall we begin?” Bittenbinder’s thin, gray mustache twitched.
“With the two bodies found outside your London club? The victims include one man, a former employee of yours, and one… Well, we are still awaiting identification. There has been some discourse about the second body’s exact classification.
What is well established, however, is the victim’s connection to you. ”
“Or,” Master Samuel Lakwa drawled, his voice as slow and rich as honey. Watery sunlight glinted off his dark glasses and the bald dome of his head. “Shall we begin with the third victim the world wants to see you hung for?”
The Master Necromancer flashed Malachy an unrepentant smile, white teeth against dark skin, as he pressed his finger down on the scales of the Tribunal’s so-called justice. The intensity of the Masters’ scrutiny pressed down on Malachy from all sides.
Malachy clenched his fists in his lap, forcing a calm expression.
“Let us begin not at the beginning, but where we ended. When you released me from my cell in the spring, on the condition I hunt down the escaped demons you still insist don’t exist. The unidentified body was Francis, a cursed Bestiamancer and the demons’ accomplice.
I dispatched Francis, as well as the memory demon Moneta and the passion demon Ishtar. ”
The Masters exchanged a look.
“Rest assured, Mr. Bane, the Tribunal will thoroughly cross examine your testimony regarding this allegedly cursed Bestiamancer’s death,” Bittenbinder said.
“In the meantime, there is a second victim to account for. The body of your late employee was discovered by police officers outside of your club. The Tribunal’s condition to waive your five-year sentence was discretion.
Instead, you have only incited further suspicions during your… special task”
“Bane, what can you tell the Tribunal about the second victim?” Master Virgil Carpathia said in a hoarse rasp. The Master Sciomancer cleared his throat, and the vicious scar cut like a jagged smile peeked over the collar of his ceremonial robe.
“I can tell you that he wasn’t a victim,” Malachy said. “Guy Haviland was killed in defense of another one of my employees. Several witnesses can corroborate the Electromancer’s escalation of violence against Cora Walcott, which culminated in attempted murder. I simply intervened.”
The Masters’ disapproval was deafening in the silence that fell. The chamber carved out of milky stone was as still as a mausoleum. Execution, Malachy knew, lurked a misstep away.
“You could not have intervened using non-lethal force?” Bittenbinder said.
“Guy was seconds from electrocuting Cora to death.”
“Do not make me repeat the question,” Bittenbinder clipped out.
“Lethal force was required.”
“That, Mr. Bane, shall be decided by the Tribunal. What is not up for debate is the negligent manner in which you left the Electromancer’s body for humans to see.”
“I took all necessary precautions, and several unnecessary ones, to conceal Guy Haviland and Francis. But Alastair Ghose, the ringleader of the escaped demons, recovered the remains and left them for the London police to find. The situation then… escalated.”
“Escalated, indeed,” Master Samuel Lakwa drawled. “Mages are on the cusp of ruinous discovery in no small part due to you.”
Malachy looked up into the pitiless dark glasses over the Master Necromancer’s eyes.
His jaw worked on a careful half-truth. “Our discovery will be due in large part to the Tribunal. Your stall tactics gave the escaped demons a three-month head start. Then you sent me out, gagged and practically blindfolded, to wrangle them up for you. I’d be hunting Ghose right now if you hadn’t thrown me in a bloody cell again. ”
“That will be all, Mr. Bane,” Lakwa said.
“Need I remind you, fine ladies and gentlemen of the Tribunal, that in addition to murder, Mr. Bane has a long and tumultuous history with violating our most sacred law—the Covenant. This trial, and his hearing in the spring, were mere footnotes in Mr. Bane’s rap sheet.
His abuse of the Profane relic Koschei’s Egg was not the first, nor the worst, of his crimes. ”
Several Masters nodded in thoughtful agreement.
Cracks formed in Malachy’s mask of calm.
“The Tribunal didn’t mind my use of Koschei’s Egg when it benefited them.
How many times have I traversed across Realms to do your dirty work?
How many corrupted spirits have I hunted down and imprisoned for you in the Demon Realm?
How many Profane relics have I scoured the earth for you? ”
“Surely my fellow Masters are not lending credence to these wild claims,” Lakwa said.
“Malachy has imprisoned more demons than any other mage, Sammy,” said Nastassja, the Master Choromancer. Silver hair framed the portal mage's angular face.
Lakwa eyed his fellow Master with contempt. “And the fact Mr. Bane used the Profane Arts to violate both mage and human laws? That means nothing to you, Nastassja?”
“That is outside the scope of this trial, Samuel,” Master Carpathia rasped. “Let us return to the current matter. Bane has told us about the first two victims. Now let us hear about the third.”
Lakwa stared hard at the Master Sciomancer.
Malachy took in this widening schism within the Tribunal in thoughtful calculation. He could pry apart these fractures between the Masters with subtle leverage, wide enough to bring the whole institution crashing down. It was tempting.
“Now, Virgil—”
“Enough.” The Master Bestiamancer cut Lakwa off with a lash of his Persian-accented voice.
Kabir stroked his trimmed beard, his dark eyes flashing amber as he took in the spectacle.
“We have Mr. Bane’s signed statement, as well as the witness testimonies.
Now let us proceed to the final death the portal mage is accused of.
We have a witness. You may vacate the seat, Mr. Bane. ”
“Of course,” Malachy said. Kabir was not a man he would soon cross. The Master Bestiamancer transformed into a bearded vulture, a fearsome creature that feasted on bones and painted itself in blood. Kabir had quite the appetite for eyeballs while in vulture form.
Malachy stood, and Ferromancer guards flanked him.
“The Tribunal shall now hear the testimony of Cora Walcott,” said the Master Hydromancer Heng Yuze in a lyrical voice. “Ms. Walcott, please come forward.”
Adrenaline ignited in Malachy’s veins as Cora materialized from the shadows of the chamber.
Two weeks had passed underwater since he last saw her, and their parting had been far from pleasant.
She was dressed all in black, like she was going to a funeral.
His funeral, perhaps. The black veil of her hat, perched on her mane of wavy hair, obscured her face.
She stepped close enough to touch. Gaze averted, she was unwilling or unable to meet his eyes as she took the lone seat.
Dread pooled in his stomach. Cora could damn him with much more than her testimony. The Unweaver had only to pull at a loose thread and he would unravel.
Ferromancer guards escorted Malachy into the far corner of the chamber, where he was forced to watch his downfall from the gloom.
“Ms. Walcott,” said the Master Ferromancer Inez Rojas. Shimmering light caught on the polished weapons her metal magic had crafted, draped across her ceremonial robe. “What is the nature of your relationship with Mr. Bane?”
“Business.” The bitter depths Cora sank into that single word. “I’m his on-call Necromancer.”
“I see,” said Master Rojas. “Has your relationship with Mr. Bane ever been romantic?”
“Romantic?” Cora scoffed. “Hardly.”
“Will your relationship with Mr. Bane prevent you from being objective in your testimony?” Bittenbinder asked.
Cora’s head swung to the shadows, and the full force of her gaze fell upon Malachy. “Not in the slightest.” She turned and addressed the Tribunal. “I communed with the third victim. I know who killed him, and why.”