HERE’S COLIN?” ANA DEMANDED the moment Tom ducked through the flap over the door.4
HERE’S COLIN?” ANA DEMANDED the moment Tom ducked through the flap over the door.
A fire blazed in the pit, Sam and Paul on the far side, Ana tightening a bandage over Paul’s upper arm. A spot of blood already stained it. A used dressing sat at Ana’s feet.
Tom caught Sam’s gaze, and Paul’s. Sam frowned; Paul spat into the fire.
He couldn’t meet his wife’s eyes.
“Sartori refused to release him,” he said, moving toward the fire, noting the aleskin to one side. He picked it up and took a long, heavy pull before setting it back down, the ale bitter on his tongue.
He caught Ana’s expression out of the corner of his eye, but turned away, settling down before the fire, across from Sam.
“What did he say?”
“He said that Colin attacked Walter with the sling, that he beat him.”
“I told you not to give him that sling, that it would only lead to trouble.” Ana jerked at the bandage and Paul winced. “And what did you say?”
“That Colin must have been provoked.”
Ana snorted and stood. “Well then, Tom Harten, you don’t know your own son as well as you think.”
Tom’s shoulders tensed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that there’s more of you and your anger inside of Colin than you can possibly imagine. More of your pride. He’s taken his share of beatings from Walter and his gang, but I wouldn’t put it past Colin to have started the fight today. What’s going to happen to him?”
“I don’t know.” When Ana didn’t respond, he glanced up to where she stood over him, hands on hips, met her gaze directly for the first time. “I don’t know! Sartori said he’d pass judgment in the morning. On Colin and all of those they took after the riot.”
The anger in Ana’s eyes hardened, the muscles of her jaw tensing.
“He arrested people from the riot?” Sam asked.
Tom didn’t turn from Ana. “Yes. Shay and a few others.”
“And he’s lumped Colin in with them?” Paul shook his head. “That’s not good. That’s not good at all.”
Tom felt the urge to punch him.
Ana’s hands fell from her hips and she turned away, began rummaging through their few possessions, rattling pots, sorting knives and utensils that didn’t need to be sorted.
“We have another problem,” Tom said, trying to ignore his wife for the moment.
“What’s that?” Sam asked. He stoked the fire with a stick, embers flaring as they rose with the smoke.
“Sartori is going to raze Lean-to. Apparently, Shay’s not one of us. He’s a member of the Avezzano Family, not a guildmember, and Sartori believes he was sent here to foment a rebellion. He’s been using us and the others in Lean-to to cause trouble, like the riot today, but Sartori’s had enough. He’s going to send in the Armory to clear us out.”
Paul leaped to his feet. “He can’t do that! We’re citizens of Andover! We have rights! We have—”
“Paul!” Sam’s voice cut across Paul’s rant like a blade, stopping him short, breath drawn in, face red. He motioned for the smith to sit down.
Paul exhaled sharply, mumbled something under his breath, but sat.
Sam turned back to Tom. The small room was silent. Even Ana had stopped moving, although she remained in the shadows.
“I assume you protested,” Sam said. “Yes.”
“You told him we had nothing to do with Shay, that we have nowhere else to go?”
“Yes.”
“And what did he say?” Ana asked.
Tom shrugged. “He said it was our problem. That we should go back to Andover or find someplace else here on the coast.”
Paul cursed loudly, and for once Ana didn’t slap him on the back of the head or protest.
“What are we going to do?” Sam said after a long silence.
“I can’t go back to Andover,” Paul said. “The Armory would snatch me up and send me to the front of the Feud in an instant.”
“For being a smith?” Ana asked incredulously.
“No,” Paul answered. He caught Tom’s gaze. “I was part of the Armor y before. The smithing came after. But there was an incident. One of the recruits who joined with me died. I saw it happen. The commander discharged me, with the understanding that I wouldn’t speak of it, wouldn’t report it to the Family. At the time, I was more than willing to get out; the Armor y wasn’t for me. The commander’s watched me for years. He was elated when I told him I was heading to New Andover. If he saw me back in Trent . . .”
“We can’t go back either,” Ana said. “We’ve used all of our coin to survive here in Portstown.”
Tom thought he would hear accusation in her words, but he didn’t. “There’s another option.”
“Sartori had another suggestion?”
“No. The West Wind Trading Company’s representative.” All of the others frowned.
Tom sighed. “He wants us—the guildmembers in Lean-to and anyone we trust—to lead an expedition onto the plains, to set up a town so that the Carrente Family can lay claim to a large swath of the inland when the Court finally gets around to dividing up the lands here.”
“We aren’t farmers, Tom. We aren’t . . . we aren’t settlers, for
Diermani’s sake!”
Tom shot Paul a glare. “I know that. I told him that. But he doesn’t seem to care.”
“What about the groups that have already been sent east?” Sam asked. “Sartori already has people who’ve settled farther inland.”
“According to Daverren, the Signal from the Company, those farmers haven’t settled far enough east for it to count. And they’re only farms. He wants another town, a place that can trade with Portstown and other towns along the coast once it’s established. He’s willing to fund the expedition, but he needs people willing to settle it, to make it work.”
“He needs people to take the risk,” Ana said roughly. “Sartori has tried a settlement before, but none of those people have ever returned, have they?”
No one said anything for a long moment. Then Sam stirred. “What did you tell him?”
Tom shook his head. “Nothing. But I don’t think we have any choice, and Daverren knows it. Sartori isn’t going to let us stay here, not after the riot. He’s not completely convinced we don’t have anything to do with Shay.”
Both Sam and Paul grimaced.
“What do you want us to do?” Sam asked, climbing to his feet. Paul followed suit.
“Spread the word. About the trial tomorrow and about the expedition. About Shay. Make certain everyone understands that Sartori is serious about destroying Lean-to.”
“What do you think is going to happen to Shay and the others?”
Tom thought about the rage he’d seen on Sartori’s face as Arten led him and Daverren back to his estate, and he frowned, troubled. “We’ll find out in the morning. But we all know they went to the dock to start a fight.”
He’d tried to keep the concern out of his voice, but when Sam and Paul ducked out through the entrance they both looked grim. Tom stood to watch them go, then turned.
To find Ana standing directly behind him. Her hand was clasped to her chest, to the pendant beneath her shirt.
“Tom,” she said, and he could hear all the fear he saw in her eyes in that one word, all the worry, the concern, the dread. And all the hatred, of Sartori and Portstown.
And beneath all that, hatred of him. For bringing them to this place. It was thin, and it was buried deep, but it was there. And it hurt.
Because he could think of nothing he could do to make it go away.
When Tom and Ana emerged from their home the following morning, the rough blanket sliding off Tom’s back as he ducked out into the weak sunlight, they found a group of men, women, and children waiting, mostly guildsmen but a few of the men from the rougher part of Lean-to that they’d befriended. Sam and Paul stood at the forefront. Karen, her father’s hand resting protectively on her shoulder, stood behind them. Her father’s face looked haggard and drawn, had looked haggard and drawn since the voyage across the Arduon and the loss of his wife and two other children to sickness, but he offered a thin smile and nod of support, his hand tightening, pulling Karen a little closer.
No one said anything, and after a brief moment, casting a quick look at Ana, taking her hand, Tom turned toward Portstown.
The twenty or so that had gathered followed, but along the way they gained more. Men and women stood outside of their huts, waiting. They touched Ana and Tom as they passed, murmured words of support, of encouragement, all in grim voices, before joining the group behind. By the time they left the ragged edges of Lean-to, the group had more than doubled.
The town was shrouded in a faint mist that slowly began to lift as they made their way down the grassy slope to the outskirts of the town proper. They passed through the low stone walls of the estates, down past the wharf and the docks, and turned toward the town’s center, toward Sartori’s land and the barracks and penance locks to one side.
As they approached, a sound intruded on the morning calm: the sharp report of hammers.
Tom frowned.
When they entered the square, Ana’s grip tightened, and she shot Tom a terrified look, halting in her tracks, hand going to her pendant. “They can’t,” she said, but then she choked on the words, denied them with a shake of her head.
Not certain what she had seen, Tom searched the mist, followed the sound of the construction—
And saw through the lifting fog the Armory, saw the gallows they had built since last night, which they were finishing now.
A hand closed around his heart, closed and tightened, and for a long moment he couldn’t breathe. His vision blurred, narrowed, a yellowish film closing in on both sides. It felt as if he’d been punched in the gut, as if he were reeling from the blow.
He would have stumbled, would have sagged to the ground, his knees weak, but Sam was suddenly at his side. “It can’t be for Colin,” he said, his voice harsh, angry. “They can’t hang him. They’ll have another riot on their hands if they do, Diermani curse them.”
The hand around Tom’s heart loosened. He blinked, steadied himself. Behind, he heard the rest of those gathered grumbling to themselves. A low warning rumble.
Straightening, he squeezed Ana’s hand in reassurance, leaned down to kiss her. He could feel her trembling, even though she stood perfectly still, back rigid.
“Colin,” she said.
“I won’t let anything happen to him. We won’t.” She pressed her lips together, nodded.
Tom turned and led the group through the square.
They passed the gate to Sartori’s estate and halted where the gallows had been built. The structure was rough, hastily put together, and stood next to the penance locks. As they approached, the Armory finished hammering into place the last of the boards on the narrow platform and climbed down. The guardsman with the broken nose who had halted Tom at Sartori’s gates the night before stepped up onto the platform and tossed a rope, noose already tied on one end, over the notch in the support beam that ran horizontally over the trapdoor in the center. He adjusted the height, then tied it off.
Arten, standing back from the platform, nodded his approval, then turned. The commander scanned the crowd from Lean-to, noted their angr y looks, their set expressions, before his gaze settled on Tom. He looked exhausted, dark circles beneath his eyes.
“Is there going to be trouble?” he asked. There was no hint of exhaustion in his voice. Behind him, the rest of the Armory guardsmen had formed a rough barrier of pikes between the gallows and the group from Lean-to.
“That depends on Sartori,” Tom said.
Arten nodded, as if he’d expected the response.
The mist burned away, sunlight glaring down from across the plains. With it came the people of Portstown, emerging from the streets in pairs and small groups, couples and families, some from the outer farms riding in on horseback. The square separated into two factions before the gallows, those from Lean-to on the left, Portstown on the right. Tom watched them all as they came in, saw some of them drop their gazes as if ashamed, saw others snort in contempt or spit to one side. Most simply refused to look in their direction, and most were taken aback by the gallows and the hangman’s noose where it swung in the gusts of wind from the ocean, troubled looks turning the corners of their mouths.
By the time Sartori made his appearance, Sedric and Walter trailing behind him, over a hundred people from Portstown had gathered, including the Patris from the church, and nearly eighty from Lean-to, most the families of guildmembers, but a large enough contingent from Shay’s group to cause the Armory to shift forward, hands on pommels. The crowd parted as the Proprietor approached, Sartori taking to the platform without hesitation, as if it had always been there, not erected that morning. Sedric and Walter took their places behind him.
Tom did not see any sign of Signal Daverren, nor any of his assistants.
“People of Portstown,” Sartori said, breaking through the low murmur that had drifted through the crowd, “it is with regret that I stand before you to pass judgment this day. As you know, the Carrente Family has seen fit to grant me these lands in New Andover, to grant me the title of Proprietor of Portstown. Unfortunately, one of the duties as Proprietor in such a wild and unsettled territory such as this is as Judge. It is my responsibility to see that justice is carried out, that crimes are punished, and it is that role I am to play today.
“As most of you know, there was an incident at the docks yesterday upon the arrival of the Tradewind.” Sartori signaled Arten, who nodded toward one of the Armory guardsmen. Word passed, and as the Proprietor continued speaking, the barracks doors opened, another escort of guardsmen emerging, leading Shay, three other members of his group, and Colin toward the gallows.
Ana tensed, took an involuntary step forward, but Tom held her back.
“These men were the instigators of the riot that followed,” Sartori proclaimed. Voices rose from the people of Portstown. “These men brought blades to the docks and attacked the Armory that were there for protection. Three of the guardsmen died.” The growl from Portstown rose, a few cursing, at least one man spitting.
“How many from Lean-to died?” Ana asked, contempt in her voice.
“At least seven,” Sam reported. “Seven associated with the guild anyway. I don’t know how many of Shay’s men died.”
Tom didn’t care. His attention was fixed on Sartori, on Colin, who stood next to Shay and the other men, last in line, shorter than the rest by at least a foot, younger by more than a decade. His son searched the crowd desperately, eyes wide and terrified, and finally latched onto his father, onto his mother. He tried to rush forward, but the ropes that bound his hands and feet brought him up short, the guardsman that had followed the prisoners out of the barracks pulling him back into place roughly.
On the platform, Sartori turned toward Shay, toward the entire line of men, including Colin.
“Portstown cannot tolerate such blatant disregard of authority,” he said, his voice lowered enough that those from Portstown were forced to quiet in order to hear him. “Because of the needless deaths of the Armory, and the fact that you came to the docks with the intent to do harm, I sentence you to be hung until dead.”
There were gasps from the crowd, a minor uproar from those from Lean-to. Ana turned, gripped Tom’s upper arm tight. “Tom.”
“I know,” he said, and shot a glance toward Sam, toward Paul. Behind, the tumult from Lean-to grew as on the platform two guardsmen shoved Shay forward, over the trapdoor, beneath the noose. He moved stiffly, rigidly, his face blank, as if he hadn’t heard anything Sartori had said, as if he couldn’t believe any of this was happening.
But that paralysis broke when they dropped the thick rope over his head and around his neck. He began to struggle, snapped his head left and right, cried out, “No! You can’t do this! I’m Avezzano, a member of the Family!” as they cinched the noose tight, writhed as the guardsmen stepped aside. But he couldn’t move, his hands still tied tightly behind his back. His breath came in ragged gasps, and sweat broke out on his forehead. In a torn voice, he cried out again, “No!” and then tried to step aside, to leap away from the trapdoor. But his legs were tied together like Colin’s, and he tripped and stumbled, fell almost to his knees.
The cord from the noose brought him up short, jerked his head back as he emitted a strangled grunt. His legs pivoted beneath him and he swung back, but it still wasn’t enough for his knees to reach the platform.
His face turned a livid red and his eyes bulged as he began to choke. Flesh bunched up under his chin, dragged there by the rope. Harsh sounds, phlegmy and distorted, like a diseased dog choking on its own blood, stretched out over the square as he struggled to get his feet under him, his legs already buckling, already weakening. A woman in the Portstown crowd screamed.
Then Arten barked a curt order, hand chopping down in a succinct, final gesture—
And someone loosed the trapdoor.
Wood slapped against wood as it fell and Shay dropped. But the rope had been pulled taut already. His neck didn’t snap. Instead, he lost all hope of finding footing. He kicked at empty air, flailed, jerked back and forth, the hastily constructed gallows creaking, shuddering as he struggled.
His spasms ended, slowly and gracelessly, his face now a bruised and blackened purple, his features contorted, his neck strangely elongated. Dark stains spread over the front and back of his breeches as he pissed and shit himself.
The square had fallen utterly silent except for a few muted sobs and the low sound of the Patris uttering a prayer, crossing himself repeatedly. Women buried their heads in convenient shoulders; children hugged their parents’ legs or remained oblivious, playing in the dirt. The men stood, faces blank, bodies rigid.
Ana whispered a prayer, her tone ragged and shocked. Her hand had tightened so hard on Tom’s that his fingers had gone numb.
He hadn’t liked Shay Jones, had tolerated him because he’d thought he was a member of the guilds, but he would never have wished such an ugly death on him. He swallowed down the taste of bile in the back of his throat, fought back the nausea. Each breath brought with it the smell of salt, of ocean—
And with one gust, the stench of urine and shit.
On the platform, Sartori grimaced and waved the guardsmen forward. They snagged Shay’s body, hauled it back onto the platform, removed the noose and carried the corpse to one side as the trapdoor was reset.
The second man spat at Sartori’s feet before the noose dropped over his neck. He didn’t struggle, didn’t even speak, his glare falling over everyone in the crowd, from Portstown and Lean-to alike. Tom hadn’t met him, although he knew he’d come from a conscript ship.
Everyone in both groups flinched when the trapdoor was released.
The third man had been a thief. He wept without a sound, struggled only at the last moment, surging forward as Arten gave the command to trigger the trapdoor. He swung back and forth, his neck snapping as the rope pulled taut.
The fourth man collapsed to his knees before they’d even removed the third man from the noose. He begged, pleaded, fell down onto his side. “I wasn’t part of the riot!” he screamed as the guardsmen dragged him across the platform, as they jerked him upright. “I wasn’t part of Shay’s group!”
Sartori simply frowned.
“You have to believe me!” the man roared. “I was there looking for work! I was there to unload the ship!” The noose tightened around his neck and he heaved in a loud, noisy, ragged breath. “I was only looking for work,” he mumbled, snot coating his upper lip. His head sagged forward, hair falling down in front of his face—
And then the trapdoor cracked open.
Before the body had stopped swinging, the crowd grew restless, a low unpleasant murmur starting on the Lean-to side, drifting slowly to the Portstown side.
There was only one more prisoner left on the platform. Colin.
“Tom,” Ana said, and this time her voice was sharp with warning, cutting deep.
Tom stepped forward, let Ana’s hand go, felt Sam and Paul step up behind him, along with a few others from Lean-to. He caught Arten’s answering movement from the side, saw Arten’s dark frown, hand resting on his sword in warning. But before either of them could do anything, Sartori turned back to the crowd. His face was grim, hard, lines etching the corners of his mouth, his eyes. He looked over everyone gathered, letting his gaze settle finally on Tom.
“Before I handle this last case,” he said, and his voice fell into complete silence, into an ominous tension that prickled against Tom’s skin, “I have an announcement.”
No one in the square moved. Tom felt Arten’s presence at his side, like a lodestone, felt every Armory guardsman and every tradesman from Lean-to where they stood, felt Colin’s nervous glance as the guardsmen shuffled him forward, as they placed him over the trapdoor.
“As Proprietor of Portstown, I have only the town’s well-being in mind. I, and my father before me, have always felt that expansion of the town and the Carrente lands to the east is a necessity for our survival. He, and I, sent expeditions onto the plains in the past, but unfortunately nothing has come of those forays. We don’t know why those expeditions failed, but we must make further attempts, or our survival here in New Andover will be in jeopardy.
“To that end, the Carrente Family, along with the West Wind Trading Company, will be sending another expedition to the east, with the intent to establish a new town, one that will be the foundation of our expansion to the east in the future. We have already gathered the necessary materials for this expedition; however we are lacking in the men and women who have the skills to make the settlement a success.
“At the West Wind Trading Company’s request, I have extended a proposal to the guildsmen in Lean-to, to Tom Harten in particular.” Sartori motioned toward Tom, and everyone’s attention shifted, drawn to him, to Sam and Paul and all of the others that stood behind him.
“Tom Harten,” Sartori said. “Will you lead this expedition? Will you journey into the plains and start this settlement? The Carrente Family would be in your debt.”
Then Sartori lowered his head. Something flickered in his eyes.
And Tom stilled. Because in the Proprietor’s gaze he could see what was truly offered, what Sartori truly meant. He’d waited to make the announcement on purpose, waited until Colin stood ready to face judgment, until Colin stood over the trapdoor, the noose dangling over his head. The message was clear.
If Tom said no, Colin would hang.
And he wasn’t the only one to see the threat behind the words. The crowd at his back stirred, restless, uneasy. A dark, fluid uneasiness, like deep ocean.
To the side, he saw Arten’s frown filled with disapproval, with something deeper.
Discontent.
But the Armory commander didn’t move. No one moved, those gathered waiting. To see how he would react, to see what he would do. And he knew that if he said no, if Sartori threatened Colin’s life because of it, that those from Lean-to, even the guildsmen, would fight. He could hear it in the dark, swelling murmur behind him, could feel it. They hadn’t done so for the others, for Shay and his group, but that was because Shay and the others had gone to the docks with knives, had planned on violence.
Colin hadn’t. His arrest in Lean-to had been witnessed, and word had spread through the nest of huts and shacks and tents like wildfire.
Tom’s eyes narrowed. He glanced toward Colin, looked into his son’s eyes, saw the fear there, the stark terror, barely contained, then turned back to Sartori.
For a single, burning moment, he wanted to take advantage of the black emotions of the crowd behind him, wanted to release them, and Sartori and Portstown be damned.
But he knew what Ana would want, knew what she’d do, knew that she would never forgive him. They hadn’t discussed the matter of the expedition, had focused on Colin, on trying to get some sleep, on holding each other for comfort to get through the night.
But he didn’t need to ask her, didn’t even need to turn to look at her. He could feel her at his back.
Drawing a deep breath, everyone around him tensing, Arten’s hand tightening on the pommel of his sword to one side, Tom said, “Yes. I’ll lead the expedition to the east.”
He was surprised. There was no bitterness in his voice at all.
Colin didn’t begin to panic until the guardsmen brought him out into the sunlight, harsh after the dimness of the barracks, and he saw his parents standing at the front of the crowd. His father’s face was drawn, somehow stark; his mother’s was terrified.
And it was that terror that reached down into Colin’s gut with a cold hand and brought a shiver of sweat to his skin.
The Armory barracks hadn’t been that bad. After seizing him in Lean-to, after allowing Walter that hard punch to the stomach, the Armory had forced Walter aside and led Colin down to the town, stumbling with pain and weak with shock. He hadn’t thought beyond his attack on Walter, on his gang. He’d thought that would be the end of it, the end of all of the fighting, that Walter would back off now that he knew Colin would fight back.
That Walter would turn to the Armory had never crossed his mind.
When the guardsmen had thrust him into the cell inside the barracks, he’d worried about what they would do to him. But then someone charged into the room, barking orders, and everyone except a few guardsmen had thrown down their cards or dice, grabbed weapons, and rushed out of the building. Those that remained hadn’t been interested in Colin at all, pacing before the tables and cots that filled the majority of the room. They hadn’t even looked in his direction.
Nearly an hour later, a group returned, leading Shay and three others, their hands trussed behind their backs. One of the men was bleeding from a cut to his shoulder. Shay looked enraged.
The guards spoke for a moment, glancing in Colin’s direction, their new prisoners shuffling beside them. Then one of them opened up the cell, motioned Colin out, and thrust Shay and the rest inside.
“We don’t want you in there with the others,” the guard said, leading Colin toward an empty cot at the back of the building.
“What happened?”
“There was a riot at the docks.”
Colin’s chest tightened, his eyes going wide. “My father was at the docks!”
The guard paused, a strange mixture of emotion crossing his face. Anger and pity and concern. He hadn’t shaven recently, the stubble gritty and coarse, brown except for a patch of white at the base of his chin where a scar cut across the flesh. He stared at Colin a moment with hard brown eyes. “What’s your father’s name?”
“Tom,” Colin said, shifting on the cot, trying to see beyond the guard, to where the others were now settling back into place or seeing to their own wounds. They left the wounded prisoner alone, not even bothering to toss him bandages. “Tom Harten. He’s a carpenter.”
The guard relaxed, smiled tightly. He ruffled Colin’s hair, and because Colin was so concerned about his father, he didn’t even try to duck away. “Your father’s fine. Stay here for tonight. The Proprietor will deal with you—and the others—tomorrow.” Before Colin could ask anything more, he turned and rejoined the other guardsmen.
Colin settled onto the cot, lying down, but he didn’t think he’d be able to sleep. Not when he didn’t know what would happen to him tomorrow morning.
But he woke hours later to the sound of voices, close enough that he didn’t open his eyes. He recognized the voice of the guard with the unshaven beard but not the other man’s. They stood right over him, barely two feet away. The rest of the barracks was silent except for an occasional snore.
“What do you think, Arten?”
The man’s voice he didn’t recognize answered. “I spoke to his father. He thinks his son was defending himself. And we all know what Walter is capable of.”
The other guard grunted. “I believe him. He hasn’t caused a lick of trouble since we took him in Lean-to. And did you see the bruises on him? I think Walter deserved whatever he got.”
Colin heard Arten shift. “You aren’t the one passing judgment on him.”
The guardsman didn’t answer. And after a long moment, the two moved away, their boots heavy on the plank flooring.
Colin’s apprehension faded after that.
Until they woke him the next morning. Until they tied his hands and feet and led him out into the sunlight and he saw the newly erected gallows and the fear on his mother’s face.
The terror settled into his stomach like a living thing, small at first, as he squinted into the light and was shoved up onto the platform behind Shay and the others. The Proprietor was speaking, but Colin didn’t listen. He struggled with the growing nausea, with the increasing sensation of something writhing in his gut.
And then they hung Shay.
He almost puked, cold sweat breaking out all over his skin as Shay flailed, as he struggled, as his face turned purple and black and finally grew still. Colin’s knees grew weak.
And then the acrid scent of piss and shit hit him, and he stilled. The nausea didn’t fade, the writhing snake in his stomach didn’t halt, but he suddenly found the strength not to buckle and collapse to the platform. Because he remembered what Walter had done to him, remembered pissing his pants, remembered what that shame had felt like.
Colin glanced to where Walter stood behind his father, beside his brother and Patris Brindisi, who was muttering one of the litanies under his breath. The guards had removed Shay’s body, had strung up the second rioter, and as he watched, the trapdoor released.
Walter turned as the body jerked and spun, a thin smile turning the corners of his mouth. When he saw Colin, the smile deepened.
Colin frowned, straightened, fought the terror back as he stared out over the crowd. And for a brief moment he succeeded, the writhing in his gut abating.
But then the third man wept, and the man who’d stood beside him the entire time collapsed and screamed, had to be dragged to the noose.
The screams unnerved him. The sound of the man’s neck breaking sent a wave of tremors through his body, and he couldn’t make the trembling stop. Fresh sweat broke out, prickling across his back, in his armpits, rank with fear.
A guard prodded him forward, forced him to halt over the trapdoor itself. He saw his father step forward from the crowd, heard the Proprietor speaking, but he couldn’t make sense of the words. His breath came in ragged gasps, the sounds filling his ears, thudding with the panicked beat of his heart, with the pulse of his disbelief.
They couldn’t hang him. Not for something so stupid. They couldn’t.
But that wasn’t what he saw in his mother’s eyes. He stopped breathing.
And in the sudden silence, in the stillness of his heart, the stillness of the crowd, he heard his father’s voice clearly.
“Yes. I’ll lead the expedition to the east.”
The stillness held for a moment longer, as if the crowd had expected a different answer, and then the Proprietor said, “I thought you might.”
Colin’s heart shuddered and started beating again. He choked on air.
The Proprietor turned toward him. “Colin Harten, for attacking Walter Carrente, a member of the Carrente Family and my son, I sentence you to a day in the penance locks.”
He waved a hand dismissively, and the guard at Colin’s back stepped forward, taking him by the shoulder and shoving him toward the edge of the platform, toward the locks that stood in the dirt to one side. He stumbled, numb with a dull sense of relief, then caught Walter’s expression.
The Proprietor’s son was pissed. Colin grinned. He couldn’t help it.
The grin held until the guardsman sat him down hard on the stump behind the lock and untied his hands as another guard—the unshaven guard, Colin realized—unlocked the top bar and raised it. Taking hold of his hair, the first guardsman shoved Colin forward, bending him at the waist, and seated his neck in the half circle that had been cut into the lower part of the lock. Two other guardsmen grabbed his arms and placed his wrists in the smaller half circles on either side.
And then the top half of the penance lock settled down over the back of Colin’s neck and wrists, the lock snapping into place. It was mildly uncomfortable. The edges of the wood beneath his neck and wrists cut into his flesh slightly, and his back was bent at an awkward angle, but it didn’t seem that bad.
The guards stepped back, but they didn’t move far. The Proprietor had already left for the docks, and those from Portstown had begun to disperse. Some lingered, a few staring at the gallows, others staring at him with pity or contempt, but they didn’t stay long. The priest Brindisi stood to one side with a look of regret.
Nearly all of those from Lean-to remained behind. Straining his neck, Colin could just make out Karen and her father near the front of the crowd. She tried to come forward, but her father held her back, and she bit her lower lip in frustrated concern.
His mother knelt in the dirt before him, brushed the hair back from his face. “Colin.” He struggled to twist his head far enough to see her, felt tears burning in his eyes, brought on by the mixed relief and distress in her voice. And because somehow he knew he’d hurt her. Hurt her in a way he’d never hurt her before.
He’d disappointed her.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and was surprised when his voice cracked, surprised at how thick and dense it sounded.
“Hush. There’s nothing to be sorry about.” She kissed his forehead. “I’ll bring you something to eat.”
“No food,” one of the guards said gruffly. “And no water.”
His mother shot him a glare. Colin couldn’t see it, but he could feel it in the way her hand stilled against his face.
And then his father pulled her back, crouched down on his heels and took Colin’s chin in his rough hands, leaning far enough forward that Colin could meet his eyes. “You’ll be fine, Colin. It’s only a day. Remember that. It’s only a day.”
Colin couldn’t read what else he meant, what he sensed his father was trying to say, but he nodded anyway, blinking back the sudden inexplicable tears.
His father released him and stood. Without saying a word to the rest of those gathered, he put his arm around Colin’s mother and led her away, heading back toward Lean-to. The rest mumbled amongst themselves, shaking their heads or narrowing their eyes at the guards, before breaking away.
Karen was dragged away by her father.
Colin kept his head raised for the first hour, so that the wood didn’t cut off his breathing. But his neck and shoulders began to ache, until eventually he couldn’t hold his head up any longer, and he slumped forward, turning so his throat wouldn’t rest on the lock itself. His wrists began tingling, the lock cutting off the circulation to his fingers. He twisted them in place, the holes large enough he had room to wriggle, and that helped. But the armholes were raised slightly, not quite in line with his neck, and soon he could feel his upper arms tingling with numbness, the sensation gradually seeping down toward his elbows.
The afternoon heat began to settle in. He could feel the lock against the back of his neck, could feel the sweat gathering between his shoulder blades, sliding down the curve of his back, beneath his arms to his chest. It dripped from his forehead, from his nose, slid into his eyes where it stung and touched his lips with salt. Flies buzzed around his head, landed with tickling feet on his hands, on his face, and he couldn’t brush them away. A prickling sensation began in his shoulders, the sudden need to move, to shift position, to scratch or fidget, spreading from a tingling itch into an incessant urge.
He began to struggle.
A small movement at first. A shifting of the arms that sent sheets of pain up through his elbows and into his wrists. He’d left his arms hanging loose for too long. They’d gone completely numb. The sensation was maddening, and so he shifted his seat on the stump—
And almost screamed, white hot pain flaring in the small of his back. He jerked away from it, his shoulders hitting the lock, rattling the bar over his neck. He hissed as his muscles protested, screaming from his neck all the way down to the base of his spine. He tried to straighten, to relieve the tension there, but was brought up short by the lock.
He cried out, a short, sharp sound.
And then he began to flail. Anger coursed through the frustration, through the stinging of the sweat and the ache of muscles. Anger at Walter, at the Proprietor, at Portstown, at his father for dragging them across the Diermani-cursed Arduon to this bloody coast. He gritted his teeth and thrashed in the lock, jerked back and forth, the wood creaking, a growl starting low in his throat, catching fire with the anger and growing, rising into a bellow of rage as he fought the lock, as it refused to budge. Fresh sweat plastered his shirt and breeches to his sides, stuck tendrils of hair to his forehead. He threw himself back and forth, tortured muscles seizing, cramping, sending white-hot flares through his calves, his sides, his neck and thighs. Jaw clenched, the bellow rose into a cracked roar, rose higher still as he heaved against his constraints—
And then it broke, trailing down into broken sobs as he collapsed against the lock, heaving, exhausted, sweat streaming from his chin.
When he’d calmed himself, he heard one of the guards chuckling, the sound low, barely audible. Colin tensed, breathing harshly through his nose.
The niggling sensation in his back hadn’t gone away.
He struggled with the lock twice more before sunset, tried to break free, to move, and each time he collapsed at the end in exhaustion, his roar of hatred dying down into painful sobs. When the guards laughed the third time, he didn’t even react. He was too tired. His throat was raw, his mouth dry. It tasted of dirt and sweat, sour with dust.
Night fell, and with it the temperature. The patrol that had stood around him all day decreased to a single guard. Colin didn’t think he could sleep in such an awkward position, but around midnight he woke to someone whispering his name.
“Colin. Colin, it’s me, Karen.”
He moaned, blinked his eyes against the moonlit darkness, tried to shift his head but cried out at the twinge in his neck. “Karen?” he croaked, the name nothing more than a wheeze.
“Yes.” Her hands touched his face, his cracked lips. She swore, her hands retreating, returning again with a wet cloth. She scrubbed at the sweat and dirt that had dried against his skin, the pressure increasing as she grew angry.
“Guard,” he managed in warning, and heard someone else kneeling down beside Karen, could barely pick out the second figure in the darkness.
“I found her watching during the day, from the corner of one of the mercantiles,” the guard said, and Colin recognized the unshaven guard’s voice. “Told her to come back tonight, while I was on duty.”
Colin would have wept, but Karen set the cloth aside and produced a skin filled with water. “Here,” she said, tipping it up and squeezing it, a stream of water splashing Colin in the face. “Drink.”
Colin swallowed as much of the water as he could, greedily, most of it dribbling off his chin to the dusty ground below. He drank as if he hadn’t had water in months. It tasted sweet. Cold and wet and delicious.
Until his stomach started to cramp.
“Careful,” the guard said, his hand pulling the skin away a moment before Colin puked everything he’d just drunk into the dirt. Spasms shook Colin’s body, aches shooting warning pangs through his stomach, back, and shoulders.
When the urge to vomit subsided, the guard said, “Now let him drink again, but slowly this time. And not too much. He won’t be able to keep it down otherwise.”
Karen wiped Colin’s face again, then let him drink again. She took the skin away before he was ready. Satisfied, the guard grunted, then stood. Colin heard him moving away in the dark.
Water sloshed as Karen set the skin aside. He heard her settling back onto her heels. Her voice was further away when she spoke.
“Is it true?”
“Is what true?” he asked, his throat still raw, voice gravelly. “Did you attack Walter?”
He would have shifted uncomfortably if he hadn’t been closed up in the lock. He wanted to lie to her, tell her it was a mistake.
“Yes,” he said finally, and hung his head.
He expected her to leave. He expected her to be disappointed with him, as his mother had been.
Instead, she shifted forward, raised his head, and after a careful moment, leaned in and kissed him on the mouth.
It was awkward, and uncomfortable, but it wasn’t unpleasant. When Karen withdrew, Colin blushed. He listened as she began to gather up the cloth, the waterskin, her motions quick, nervous. She stood.
“I’ll see you tomorrow, when they release you,” she said.
She hesitated a moment, then left, footsteps receding in the darkness.
He fell back asleep with his cheeks still burning.
And woke hours later, abruptly, when someone punched him on the back of the head, hard. He cried out, jerked back, forgetting that he was trapped in the lock. Wood brought him up short, scraping his wrists, his neck, drawing blood. He spat a curse, one he’d heard his father using on a regular basis. Someone laughed, was joined by a few others. Colin listened carefully, picked out four people in the darkness.
Walter and his gang.
His eyes narrowed and he clenched his jaw.
“Hello, Colin,” Walter said, flicking Colin’s ear with one finger. Colin flinched, but refused to react in any other way. “This isn’t exactly what I had in mind for you when I summoned the Armory. But my father needed something from your father, and, as usual, his needs came first. I wanted something more damaging, perhaps even more permanent, like what the others got.”
Colin wondered where the guard had gone, realized that Walter had probably ordered the guard away.
“Oh, well,” Walter said, standing with an exaggerated sigh. “It was fun watching you shake in terror on the gallows. However, Brunt and Gregor haven’t had their fun yet, so we brought you a little present.” He heard Walter retreat, heard fumbling, the rustle of cloth, low anticipatory chuckling.
And then something struck him in the face, a stream of liquid, joined a moment later by another, then two more. He spluttered, tried to pull away, then realized it wasn’t water and pressed his lips tight, closed his eyes, ducked his head, and breathed in tight, infuriated heaves through his nose, hands groping the darkness uselessly. The laughter rose with the stench of piss, until all four streams trickled off and died. He shook his head like a wet dog, felt a momentar y thrill of satisfaction when Walter and the rest cursed and leaped back out of range. But the satisfaction didn’t last.
He thought they’d return again, try something else to humiliate him, but even as he tensed he heard their voices fading into the distance.
The guard returned a short time later but said nothing, even though the reek of urine was obvious.
No one else visited him that night or the next morning. When the time came to release him, his parents were waiting, along with Karen and her father, Sam and Paul, a few others from Lean-to, and Patris Brindisi. The guard who had allowed Karen to help him and the commander of the Armory released the lock, sharing a dark glance when they got close enough to smell the piss, the priest presiding over it all. Colin couldn’t stand, his muscles cramping. He cried out and fell to the ground, his mother at his side instantly. His father and Sam finally made a seat by clasping hands, lifting Colin and carrying him from the square back to Lean-to, his arms over their shoulders, escorted by a covey of grumbling supporters.
Once home, his mother washed off the urine, the dust, and cleaned the wounds on his neck and wrists, the water burning the scrapes and cuts. She fed him, slowly, in small doses, and massaged his arms and legs, shoulders and back, until the cramps subsided. Colin moaned and cried out as she did so, and tremors shook his body.
But he did not weep. He buried that urge beneath the anger, beneath the hatred.
He buried the tears deep.