Frey had learned long ago that the violent clenching of the muscles in his lower leg could send him wild with agony. Today, his torturer had introduced him to the joys of electrocution. Instead of just his leg seizing up, now it happened to his entire body at once.
If he survived this, Frey decided, he’d have to rethink his definition of pain.
Blinding, shocking torment; his back arching involuntarily; muscles tensed so hard they could break bone; teeth gritted and jaw pulled back in a grimace.
And then the pain was gone. The joy was enough to make him want to break down and weep. He slumped forward in the chair as much as his restraints would allow, sweat dripping off his brow, chest heaving.
‘Do you want to be hurt? Is that it?’ the torturer asked.
Frey raised his head with some difficulty. The torturer was looking at him earnestly, wide grey eyes sympathetic and understanding. He was a handsome fellow, square-jawed and neat, wearing a carefully pressed light blue uniform in the ducal colours of Lapin.
‘You should have a go at this,’ Frey said, forcing out a fierce grin. ‘Gives you quite a kick.’
The guard standing by the door—a burly man in an identical uniform to the torturer—smiled at that for a moment, before realising he wasn’t supposed to. The torturer tutted and shook his head. He moved over to the machine that stood next to Frey’s chair. It was a forbidding metal contraption, the size of a cabinet, with a face of dials and semicircular gauges.
‘Obviously it’s not kicking hard enough,’ the torturer said, turning one of the dials a few notches.
Frey braced himself. It did no good.
The pain seemed like it would never end, until it did. The room swam back into focus. He’d always pictured torture chambers as dank and dungeon-like, but this place was clean and clinical. More like a doctor’s surgery than a cell. The electric lights were bright and stark. There were all kinds of instruments in trays and cabinets, next to racks of bottles and drugs. Only the metal door, with a viewing-slot set into it, gave away the true nature of this place.
The confession sat on a small table in front of him. A pen waited next to it. The torturer had obligingly read it out to him yesterday, before they began. It was pretty much as he’d expected: I, Frey, admit every damn thing. I conspired with my crew to kill the Archduke’s son because we’re greedy and bad, and then we all laughed about it afterwards. It was all my idea and certainly nobody else’s, especially not Duke Grephen’s or Gallian Thade’s, who are both spotless and loyal subjects of our revered leader, and whose very faeces smell of roses and almond, et cetera, et cetera.
The torturer picked up the pen and held it out to him. ‘End it, Darian. Why struggle? You know there’s no way out of here. Why must you make the last few hours of your life so miserable?’
Frey blinked sweat out of his eyes and stared dully at the pen. Why didn’t he just sign it? It was only a formality. As soon as Grephen arrived with a judge, they’d be tried and hanged anyway, though not necessarily in that order.
But he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t sign that paper because he didn’t want to make it easy on them. Because he’d fight for every moment he had left, eke out every inch of existence there was to be had.
Confessing was giving up. He wasn’t resisting in the hope of achieving anything; he was resisting just to resist. It didn’t matter how futile it was. He was bitter that he’d got so close, that he’d almost managed to get his crew out of the mess he’d got them into. It enraged him.
So he relished the small victories that were left. However she did it, Jez had got away, and taken the Ketty Jay with her. The fact that Grephen wasn’t hurrying back immediately to dispose of his prisoners suggested that Trinica Dracken had neglected to mention that she’d lost the Ketty Jay en route. Unwittingly, Dracken had bought them some time.
He’d embarrassed her twice now. He took solace in that. He hadn’t failed to notice that Trinica kept her compass and charts close to her at all times now. She’d been carrying them as they were shuttled from the deck of the Delirium Trigger to the landing pad at Mortengrace. She was nervous that they might be stolen again, and didn’t want to leave them in her cabin.
Small victories. But victories, nevertheless.
He didn’t hold out hope of Jez coming back. Not only would it be stupid, she had no real reason to. They were just a crew, like many she’d taken up with before. Though efficient at her job, she’d always seemed stand-offish, keeping to her cabin most of the time. He didn’t imagine she held any particular affection for them, and he had no reason to expect loyalty. After all, she’d barely joined before he turned her into an outlaw.
But the Ketty Jay survived, and with a new captain at the helm. That was alright with Frey. If he couldn’t have her, he was glad that someone could, and he’d always liked his diminutive navigator. He’d always wonder how Jez did it, though he took consolation in the fact that he wouldn’t have to wonder long.
I suppose Slag made it too, he thought. I wonder how he’s going to get on with his new captain.
‘Sign!’ the torturer urged, pressing the pen into his hand.
Frey took it. ‘Give me the paper,’ he said.
The torturer’s eyes lit up eagerly. He moved the table closer, so Frey could write on it. The leather cuffs he wore were attached to straps that gave him a few inches of slack. The torturer presumably thought a man couldn’t spasm efficiently without a little room to writhe.
‘Bit closer. I can’t reach,’ said Frey. The torturer did as he was asked. ‘Can you hold the paper steady? This isn’t easy with one hand.’
The torturer smiled encouragingly as he steadied the paper for Frey to sign. He stopped smiling when Frey stabbed the pen into the soft meaty part between his thumb and forefinger.
A third man in uniform burst in through the door, and stood bewildered at the sight that faced him. The torturer was wheeling around the room, shrieking, holding his impaled hand, which still had a pen sticking out of it. The guard by the door was in paroxysms of laughter. Frey had crumpled the confession into a ball and was trying to get it into his mouth to eat it, but couldn’t quite reach. He paused guiltily as the newcomer stared at him, then let it drop from his hand.
‘What do you want?’ screamed the torturer, when he got his breath back.
‘You can stop now,’ said the newcomer.
‘But he’s not confessed!’
‘We’ll draft a new one and sign it for him. The Duke is back with a judge. He wants this done.’
‘Can’t you give me an hour?’ the torturer whined, seeing his chance at revenge slipping away.
‘I’m to take charge of him immediately,’ the newcomer insisted. ‘Get him out of that chair. He’s coming with me.’
The sky was blue. Clear, cloudless and perfect. Frey squinted up at the sun and felt it warm his face. Amazing, he thought, how the north coast of the continent was gripped in ice and yet it was still pleasant here in the south. Vardia was so vast, its northern edge breached the Arctic Circle while its southern side came close to the equator. He’d always thought of winter as the grimmest season; but like anything, he supposed, it depended on where you were standing.
The spot chosen for his execution was a walled courtyard behind the barracks, where the militia conducted their drills. There was a small raised platform in the centre where a general might stand to oversee proceedings. A wrought iron lamp-post projected from its centre, flying the Duke’s flag. Ornamental arms projected out from the lamp-post. They were intended for hanging pennants, but the pennants had been removed and a noose thrown over one of the arms to form a crude gallows. The end of the noose lay loosely around Frey’s neck. An executioner—a massive, sweaty ogre with a thin shirt stretched over an enormous gut—waited to pull it taut.
A small crowd was assembled before him. There were two dozen militia, a judge, the Duke, and two witnesses: Gallian Thade and Trinica Dracken. Off to one side was a wagon with bars on its sides. Inside this wheeled cag
e were the remainder of his crew. They were unusually subdued. The seriousness of their situation had sunk in at last. Even Pinn was getting it now. They were going to watch their captain die. Nobody felt like joking.
He’d always wondered how he’d face death. Not the quick, hectic rush of a gun-battle but the slow, considered, drawn-out finale of an execution. He’d never imagined that he’d feel quite so serene. The wind stirred a lock of hair against his forehead; the sun shone on his cheeks. He felt like smiling.
The Darian Frey they were about to kill wasn’t the same Darian Frey they’d set out to frame for their crime. That man had been a failure, a man who lurched from crisis to disaster at the whim of fate. A man who had prided himself on being better than the bottom-feeding scum of the smuggling world, and hadn’t desired any more than that.
But he’d surprised them. He’d turned and fought when he should have run. He’d evaded and outwitted them time and again. He’d turned a bunch of dysfunctional layabouts into something approximating a crew. Stories would be told of how they tweaked the nose of the infamous Trinica Dracken in a hangar bay in Rabban. Word would spread. Freebooters all over Vardia would hear of Darian Frey, and his craft, the Ketty Jay. He’d come close to unearthing a daring conspiracy against the ruling family of the land, involving a Duke of Vardia, the legendary pirate captain Orkmund, and the mighty Awakener cult.
Only a final twist of ill fortune had stopped him. Trinica had made copies of the charts he stole. Without the compass she couldn’t make it through the magnetic mines that guarded Retribution Falls, but she could wait at the point where she knew he’d emerge.
One little slip-up. But he’d led them a merry chase all the same. They might have caught him, but he still felt like he’d won.
He looked at the faces behind the bars: Malvery, Crake, Silo, Harkins . . . even Pinn. He was surprised to find he was sad to be leaving them. He didn’t want it all to end now. He’d just begun to enjoy himself.
Frey had stopped listening to the list of crimes and accusations that the judge was reading out. The preliminaries were unimportant. He was thinking only of what was to come. Death was inevitable. He accepted that, and was calm. His hands were tied securely before him, and there were two dozen guards with rifles waiting to fill him with bullets if he should try to escape.
But he still had one trick left to play. The world would remember him, alright. Maybe they’d never know the truth, but they’d know his name.
The judge, an ancient, short-sighted relic who was more than half dust, finished his rambling and looked up, adjusting his spectacles.
‘Sentence of death has been passed,’ he droned. ‘Tradition grants the prisoner the opportunity to make a last request. Does the prisoner have such a request?’
‘I do,’ said Frey. ‘To be honest, I consider it a bit of an insult that the Duke couldn’t even provide a decent gallows to hang me by. I request an alternative method of execution.’
Duke Grephen’s sallow face coloured angrily. Trinica watched the prisoner curiously with her black eyes.
‘I’d like to be beheaded with my own cutlass,’ Frey said.
The judge looked at the Duke. Grephen swiped a strand of lank blond hair from his forehead and huffed.
‘I can see no objection,’ creaked the judge warily, in case the Duke had any objection.
‘Fetch his cutlass!’ Grephen cried. One of the guards hastened away to obey.
Frey stared at the Duke coolly. Even in his uniform, he looked like a spoiled boy. His deeply set eyes glittered with childish spite. He was a cold and humourless man, Frey surmised that much. He’d murdered dozens on board the Ace of Skulls, just to kill the Archduke’s son in such a way that it could be pinned on someone else. Frey didn’t believe it bothered him one bit. If there was any warmth in him, it was reserved for the Allsoul.
Next to him stood Gallian Thade. Sharp-faced, beak-nosed, with a pointed black beard. He was all angles and edges, where the Duke was soft and pudgy. Thade watched him with an air of smugness. He’d waited a long time to see the man who had deflowered his daughter receive his punishment.
And then there was Trinica. He couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Her ghost-white face revealed nothing. Would she be pleased to see him die? Would she finally be able to close the chapter of her life that had begun with him? Or was she even now remembering fonder moments from their past, wondering if she’d done the right thing in bringing him here?
Grephen had destroyed the Ace of Skulls; Thade had picked Frey to frame for it; Trinica had caught him.
He had reason to kill them all. But he’d only have time to do one of them. And he’d already chosen his target.
The guard returned from the barracks with his cutlass. Grephen took it and inspected it before passing it to the executioner. The executioner ran his thumb admiringly down the blade, then hissed through his teeth as he slashed the tip open.
‘Could you get this thing off me?’ Frey asked, jiggling his shoulders to indicate the noose. The executioner thrust the cutlass into his belt and removed the noose with one hand, sucking his bleeding thumb with the other.
‘Kneel down, mate,’ he said. Frey went to his knees on the wooden platform at the foot of the lamp-post. He shifted his wrists inside their knots of rope and rolled his neck.
He looked over at the cage, where his crew were imprisoned. Once he was dead, they’d follow him. Pinn seemed bewildered. Crake’s gaze was heavy with tragedy. Silo was inscrutable, Harkins was cringing in a corner and looking away. Malvery gave him a rueful smile and a thumbs-up. Frey nodded in silent thanks for his support.
‘Sentence of execution by beheading,’ said the judge, ‘to be carried out in the sight of these eminent witnesses.’
The executioner drew the cutlass and took aim, touching the blade to the back of Frey’s neck. ‘Don’t worry, eh?’ he said. ‘One swipe and it’ll be done.’
Frey took a breath. One swipe. He saw the blade descending in his mind’s eye. He saw himself dropping one shoulder, rolling, holding up his hands as the daemon-thralled sword slashed neatly through his bonds. He saw the blade jump from the hands of the executioner and into Frey’s grasp. He saw the surprise on Grephen’s face as Frey flung it from the podium. He saw it slide point first into the Duke’s fat heart.
The sword always knew his will. He might go down in a hail of bullets, but the author of his misery would go down with him. And all of Vardia would know how Duke Grephen died at the hands of an insignificant little freebooter, who had outwitted him at the last.
‘Kill him,’ said Grephen to the executioner.
The executioner raised the cutlass. Frey closed his eyes.
Ready . . .
The blade quivered, and he fancied he heard the harmonic singing of the daemon within.
Ready . . .
And then a loud voice cried: ‘STOP!’
Thirty-Five
The Suspicions Of Kedmund Drave—Frey Says His Piece—The Sticky Matter Of Proof—Death In The Courtyard
The voice that had halted the execution belonged to Kedmund Drave, the most feared of the Century Knights, who Frey had last seen lying on a landing pad in Tarlock Cove after he emptied a shotgun into Drave’s chest. His moulded crimson armour showed no signs of the encounter as he swept across the courtyard towards Duke Grephen, his thick black cape swaying around him.
To either side were Samandra Bree and Colden Grudge. Frey recognised them from their ferrotypes. Samandra was wearing the outfit she was famous for: battered coat and boots, loose hide trousers, a tricorn hat perched on her head. Grudge, in contrast, looked like something half-ape. Shaggy-haired and bristle-faced, he was a hulking mass of dirty armour barely contained inside the folds of a hooded cloak. His autocannon clanked against his back. It was a gun bigger than most men could even carry, let alone fire.
‘What exactly is going on here?’ Drave demanded, striding up to the Duke. They could scarcely have been more different: the soft, spoiled aristocrat
in his neatly pressed uniform and the iron-hard figure of the Knight, his silver-grey hair shorn close to his scalp and his cheek and neck horribly scarred.
Grephen collected himself, overcame the physical intimidation and attempted to assert his Ducal authority. ‘These men are pirates,’ he said. ‘They have been condemned to death. I wasn’t aware there was any law forbidding a Duke to deal with pirates inside his own duchy. As you can see, I have a judge here to ensure everything is legal.’
Drave stared at the old judge, who began to look nervous.
‘I see,’ he said slowly. ‘I imagine the trial has been thorough and fair.’
Grephen bristled. ‘Remember who you’re talking to, sir. You may have the Archduke’s authority but even the Archduke knows to respect his Dukes.’
‘I’m not in the business of respect,’ Drave snarled. He turned to the judge. ‘There has been a trial, I assume?’
The judge looked shiftily at Grephen and swallowed. ‘I was brought here to oversee the executions. The Duke assured me that their guilt was not in question.’
‘You’ve obtained confessions, then?’ Drave asked Grephen.
Frey grinned. There wouldn’t have been time to make up and sign another confession after he’d ruined the last one.
‘They were caught red-handed in an act of piracy,’ Grephen declared, flushing angrily. ‘There was no need for a confession, or a trial. I exercised my ducal authority, as is my right. Besides, they admitted it.’
‘Did we, bollocks!’ Malvery yelled from the cage. ‘He’s lying!’
‘You shut up!’ growled Colden Grudge, pointing a meaty finger at the doctor.
‘We’re innocent!’ Pinn cried, joining in happily. For a while his faith in a last-second intervention had wavered; but now here it was, and all was right with the world again.
Drave turned his gaze to Trinica. ‘Trinica Dracken. You caught these men?’
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