Next to him hung the older woman from The Laughing Gnome, the one who had mentioned that the Imperialists had burned Kilnar. Above both of them were signs reading TRAITOR. Planks circled the prisoners, and around them paced the sheriff of Ratibor. In his hands he held a short whip comprising several strands knotted at the ends, which he wagged threateningly as he walked. The whole city garrison had turned out to keep the angry crowd at bay. Archers were poised on roofs, and soldiers armed with shields and unsheathed swords threatened any who approached too close.
Many of the faces in the stocks were familiar to Arista from the night before. She was shocked to see mothers, who had sung their children to sleep on the floor of the tavern, now locked in stocks beside their husbands, sobbing. The children reached out for their parents from the crowd. The treatment of the woman from Kilnar disturbed her the most. Her only crime was telling the truth, and now she hung before the entire city, awaiting the whip. The sight was all the more terrifying because Arista knew it could have been her up there if Quartz had not intervened.
A regally dressed man in a judge’s robe and a scribe approached the stocks. When they reached the center of the square, the scribe handed a parchment to the judge. The sheriff shouted for silence, and then the judge held up the parchment and began to read.
“‘For the crimes of conspiracy against Her Royal Eminence the empress Modina Novronian, the New Empire, Maribor, and all humanity; for slander against His Excellency the empress’s imperial viceroy; and for the general agitation of the lower classes to challenge their betters, it is hereby proclaimed good and right that punishment be laid immediately upon these criminals. Those guilty of conspiracy are hereby ordered to be flogged twenty lashes and spend one day in stocks, not to be released until sunset. Those guilty of treason will receive one hundred lashes and, if they remain alive, will be left hanging until they expire from want of food and water. Anyone attempting to help or lend comfort to any of these criminals will be likewise found guilty and receive similar punishment.’” He rolled up the parchment. “Sheriff Vigan, you may commence.”
With that, he thrust the scroll into the hands of the scribe and promptly walked back the way he had come. With a nod from the sheriff, a soldier approached the first stock and ripped open the back of the young mother’s dress. From somewhere in the crowd, a child screamed, yet without pause the sheriff swung his whip, even as the poor woman cried for mercy. The knots bit into the pale skin of her back and she howled and danced in pain. Stroke after stroke fell with the scribe standing by, keeping careful track. By the time it was done, her back was red and slick with blood. The sheriff took a break and handed the whip to a soldier, who performed similar punishment on her husband as the sheriff sat by, leisurely drinking from a cup.
The crowd, already quiet, grew deadly still as they came to the woman from Kilnar, who began screaming as they approached. The sheriff and his deputies took turns whipping her, as the day’s heat made such work exhausting. The fatigue in their arms was evident by the wild swings that struck the woman high on her shoulders as well as low on her back, and even occasionally as low as her thighs. After the first thirty lashes, the woman stopped screaming and only whimpered softly. The whipping continued, and by the time the scribe counted sixty, the woman merely hung limp. A physician approached the post, lifted her head by her hair, and pronounced her dead. The scribe made a note of this. They did not remove her body.
The sheriff finally moved to Emery. The young man was not daunted after seeing the punishment carried out on the others, and made the bravest showing of all. He stood defiant as the soldier with the whip approached him.
“Killing me will not change the truth that Viceroy Androus is the real traitor and guilty of killing King Urith and the royal family!” he managed to shout before the first strokes of the whip silenced him. He did not cry out but gritted his teeth and only dully grunted as the knots turned his back into a mass of blood and pulpy flesh. By the last stroke, he also hung limp and silent, but everyone could see him breathing. The physician indicated such to the scribe, who dutifully jotted it down.
“Those people didn’t do anything,” Arista said as the crowd began to disperse. “They’re innocent.”
“You, of all people, know that isn’t the point,” Royce replied.
Arista whirled. She opened her mouth, hesitated, and then shut it.
“Alric had twelve people publicly flogged for inciting riots when the church was kicked out of Melengar,” he reminded her. “How many of them were actually guilty of anything?”
“I’m sure that was necessary to keep the peace.”
“The viceroy will tell you the same.”
“This is different. Mothers weren’t whipped before their children, and women weren’t beaten to death before a crowd.”
“True,” Royce said. “It was only fathers, husbands, and sons who were whipped bloody and left scarred for life. I stand corrected. Melengar’s compassion is astounding.”