The Executioner's Rebellion (The Executioner's Song Book 4)

by D. K. Holmberg

  “Facts,” he said, shaking his head again. “You don’t care much about that either.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “Because you’re here.”

  “Just because I’m here doesn’t mean I don’t care about facts,” Finn said. “You could argue that my presence here would indicate that I care very much about them. Now, why don’t you tell me a little bit about yourself? Maybe you can tell me where you live.”

  “Why? So you can go and round up my friends and family so you can torment them the same way?” He leaned his head back and Finn anticipated him spitting on him again, but instead, he just clenched his jaw, looking as if he intended to refuse any further answers.

  “That’s not how I do things,” Finn said.

  “I’ve heard about you,” Jonrath said.

  “Yeah? Rumors have a way of spreading in the city. Not all of them are true.”

  “Enough of them are true,” he said.

  Finn studied him, trying to decide how best to approach him. At this point, he no longer knew the proper technique.

  In the back of his mind were the prompts from Master Meyer, from the king, even from Esmerelda. All of them were warnings, messages to him to find answers. The king wanted the Hunter. Meyer wanted Finn to be a skilled executioner. Esmerelda wanted him to find his own way, but what did that mean?

  “I won’t round up any of your family, but I will question them,” he said.

  Jonrath watched him. “What reason should I tell you how to find them, then?”

  “Because you know I’m going to find them anyway.”

  Jonrath laughed darkly. “You aren’t going to find shit.”

  “You said that you heard rumors about me.”

  “I did.”

  “And what did those rumors tell you?”

  “They don’t tell me shit.”

  Finn smiled tightly. “Perhaps not. But I can tell you what I know of those rumors.” He leaned forward, holding his gaze on Jonrath, forcing him to meet Finn’s eyes. “You would have heard rumors of my persistence. If there’s anything that I’m known for, it’s stubbornness. When I have a nugget of truth, I keep digging and digging until I dislodge it in its entirety. In your case, I know there’s a nugget of truth in what I have already uncovered. And I will keep digging.”

  “So?”

  Finn leaned back. “So you either give me the opportunity to approach those who know you and find the truth about the Black Rose, or you force me to find them on my own.” He left the threat there and waited.

  Jonrath didn’t say anything, and he gave Finn no reaction, but Finn wasn’t sure what he might do anyway.

  “If you hurt any of them…”

  “Yes?”

  Jonrath regarded him for a long moment before shaking his head.

  Finn just smiled again, making a tight expression as he watched him. “That is your choice. Not a choice I would make, but I respect that it is your choice.” He got to his feet. “What I ask of you today is far simpler than what I asked of you before. I only want to know about the Black Rose.” Finn looked over his shoulder at Jonrath as he moved past, heading toward the cabinets. “Anything you know.”

  He needed information. The attacks in the city would only escalate.

  He needed to find the members of the Black Rose movement.

  This was what the king had asked of him.

  Something more was taking place. The slender rod might simply be a weapon—but it might be something more. He didn’t know if this was connected to what he’d faced with Holden and Elizabeth Jarvis when they had attacked the city with magic, or something altogether different.

  He returned to the stool. “I might have been a little too eager,” Finn said.

  The man glowered at him. “Now you’re thinking you were too eager?”

  “I thought I could get you to share a bit about yourself with me—so I could understand you.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out the rod, tapping it on his hand. “That was a mistake. You see, I think I already understand all I need to about who you are. And I can see you’re hesitant to speak about the Black Rose.” Finn needed to find something to help with that, but he kept coming up with nothing. He held the rod up. “Why don’t we get into where you acquired this?”

  Jonrath’s gaze lingered on the rod, though not for long. He turned his attention back to Finn, then looked down, as if to try to work free of the leathers holding him in the chair.

  “Do you remember what I told you about what happened in this space?”

  The man glowered at him again.

  “That’s right.” He held out the rod. Wand? He couldn’t tell. To get him to talk, Finn would have to reveal more. “We’ve had others who thought to use something similar to this. They were stopped.” Finn rested the wand in front of him. “I don’t suppose you know the name Holden?”

  He watched for any sign of reaction, but either Jonrath didn’t know the name or he was skilled enough to avoid reacting. It could be either.

  Esmerelda’s conversation after the sentencing came back to him. She had been concerned about something more—something worse than Holden. And he had been incredibly difficult for them to deal with. If there was something else coming, another attack that would be similar, Finn needed to do whatever he could to stop it. The problem was that he didn’t know what it would take or whether he was even the right person to do so. He wasn’t magically powered. The sword Justice might have enough power in its blade to do so, but him?

  He didn’t have answers. That left Finn irritated, which wasn’t the right frame of mind to be in to do what he needed to do, but that didn’t change the fact that it needed doing.

  Finn thought about a different tactic.

  “Have you heard of ostia and melander?”

  He said it casually, but watched Jonrath nonetheless. Lena suddenly coming into a supply of ostia and melander—two rare medicines—might be connected to the movement, though he wondered if he were just grasping for answers now.

  “Are they flowers?”

  Jonrath seemed genuinely confused. Maybe there was nothing to that.

  Finn sighed. If there wasn’t anything to that, then he had to get back to his original concern: money. “Someone is funding the Black Rose. That’s what I need to know about,” Finn went on. “Share what you can.”

  “I’m not telling you shit.”

  Finn held on to the wand, tapping it on his hand as he regarded him. Someone had to be financially supporting the movement. There were posters. Pamphlets. Organization. If he could find the money, he thought he could uncover the truth about the Black Rose—and bring the answers the king wanted.

  When Jonrath stared at him defiantly, Finn finally let out a sigh. “I’m afraid that’s not acceptable to me, so we will continue the questioning process.”

  The iron masters dragged Jonrath away, and Finn didn’t have any clearer answers about what he might have been responsible for doing than he had before. He rarely encountered someone so determined to avoid answering questions. Any at all. His refusal was all the answer Finn needed about whether he was guilty. The problem was that Finn didn’t know what he was guilty of.

  He reached the main hall in Declan and came across one of the iron masters he had once been friendly with. There had been a time when Finn had tried to be friendly with all of them, but that had proven to be a mistake. There wasn’t anyone in the city with whom he should connect. Not anymore.

  “You come to see the bastard responsible for killing those Archers?” Norem asked.

  He was a smallish man, though looked to have a strong frame. All iron masters had to have a certain physicality to them in order to do their job; otherwise, they’d be overpowered by their charges.

  “What man is that?”

  “Ah. Thought you heard already and that was why you were here. Just brought him in. Got caught after the last protest. Damn thing burned down two shops and trampled a few other bastards.”

  Fi
nn just nodded. He’d been there for part of that protest—and had been more involved than he had wanted to be. He kept waiting for the Archers to react to the killings, but with the Palace Archers now a part of the patrols, there was a more militaristic approach.

  Still, all of this felt like kindling getting ready to be set on fire. All it needed was a light.

  “When did he come in?” Finn asked.

  “Not long ago. He’s down in his cell.”

  Finn nodded and veered off. He’d probably need to question him, but first he figured he would try to see if he could uncover anything from him by just seeing him in captivity. The lower level of Declan had a stench to it. Today it seemed worse. There was something almost rotten about the odor.

  Finn wrinkled his nose, nodding to the pair of iron masters who had dragged Jonrath back to his cell and had taken guard near the stairs, before heading along the row of cells.

  Declan was designed specifically to be a prison, not at all like what he’d seen from Hecindan prison, a place that had been converted from something else. Declan was stout, impenetrable, and the rows of cells were designed to be as unpleasant as possible while containing the prisoners.

  He stopped in front of a cell that held a man he didn’t recognize. The black metal bars of the cell were thick, nearly four fingers across. Men had scraped at the metal over the years, leaving some of it grooved, though because of the thickness of the bars, it made little difference.

  He looked between the bars, peering at the man.

  He was young, barely twenty years old. He had a bit of scruff to his cheeks, dirtiness to his arms and legs, and close-cropped hair. He was dressed in the prison gray, and cowered in the back of the cell.

  “What’s your name?” Finn called through the bars.

  “He won’t talk. That one is too precious to say much of anything.”

  Finn looked over his shoulder to see Olivan, his hands gripping the bars. The older man had been imprisoned in Declan for the last few years, held here as his sentence. It was a foul sentence, but one that was deserved given his crimes. Olivan was a repeat offender, having stolen from people all over the city. He had another year left of his sentence, then he would be released. At that point, Finn had no idea what would befall him. Somebody like Olivan, someone who had been imprisoned as long as he had, might not know what to do with himself other than live in the prison.

  “Stay out of it,” Finn said.

  Olivan laughed and banged his hands on the bars. “Listen to the hangman. Gets all excited when he got a new charge to question.”

  “Not excited,” Finn said, turning away from Olivan and looking into the cell.

  “What’s your name?” Finn asked again.

  The boy looked up, a hint of uncertainty in his eyes. “Walter Briggs, sir.”

  Finn grunted. He recognized the name. Worse, he knew why.

  He was from the Brinder section. Finn hadn’t known him well, but he had known him. When Finn had last lived in the section, Walter had been a young man, barely into his early teens, running through the streets, and now…

  He looked through the bars of the cell, regarding the boy with a renewed interest; he took in the sight of him, trying to measure something about him.

  This was somebody who’d killed an Archer?

  Finn had been around killers before and Walter didn’t seem the type, though he knew accidents could happen.

  “Come over here,” Finn said.

  The boy looked up, locking eyes with him. “Is it time?”

  “Time for what?” Finn asked.

  “Time for me. You’re here to execute me, aren’t you?”

  Finn frowned and shook his head. “That’s not how it works.”

  “But he called you the hangman.”

  “Because I am,” Finn said.

  “So you are here to take me.”

  “I’m not here to take you, but I can’t deny that you might be sentenced. It remains to be seen what that sentencing will be.”

  “I deserve anything that happens to me,” he said, his words soft, reserved.

  “Why do you say that?” Finn asked.

  “Because I…” He looked down at his pants and picked at the fabric. “I did it. That’s what you want to hear? I did what they said I did.”

  “You killed the Archers?”

  “I did.”

  There were times when Finn got confessions easily, though lately, most of the confessions he got were forced, requiring him to work at them. Getting one so simply, hearing it from Walter in this way, was almost anticlimactic.

  It made up for how difficult it had been with Jonrath.

  “You will come with me,” Finn said. He nodded to the iron masters at the end of the cell. “Bring him up to the chapel. He doesn’t need to be strapped.”

  At the mention of strapping, the boy’s eyes widened, and he started backing away from the bars of the cell.

  Finn just grunted.

  He headed through the prison, making his way up the stairs, back to the chapel, and paused. The room stank from when Jonrath had been here, and it was more than just the stench of somebody who had been imprisoned for a while. It was the stink of rot.

  He hadn’t noticed it before, but maybe having come through the hallways made him much more acutely aware of it now, or maybe it was simply the fact that it didn’t smell quite right.

  He covered his nose.

  Could he really be getting that sensitive to smells? Finn had to come to Declan regularly, so there was no getting away from the smells of this place. He didn’t have to like them.

  It didn’t take long before the iron masters brought the boy in and tossed him into the chair. He looked up at them, his eyes wide, before jerking his head around and looking at Finn, taking in the sight of the metal implements resting on the counter. There was a purpose in having them there, and the boy started whimpering immediately.

  Finn looked over to the iron masters. “You can go.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “He’s not going anywhere,” Finn said.

  They nodded and pulled the door closed, leaving Finn with the boy.

  “Why don’t we start with you telling me where you’re from?”

  It was the same conversation he’d been having with Jonrath, and while that had gone slowly, almost painfully, he at least felt he could get somewhere with this boy.

  “I’m in the Brinder section.”

  Why did it have to be Brinder?

  “What street do you live on?”

  “Graned Street. It’s a small house. My papa tried to keep it up as well as he could, but when he got sick, he wasn’t able to do it.”

  Finn pulled the stool over and took a seat in front of the boy. “Tell me what happened.”

  “You already know what happened. I’m sure of it. That’s the only reason they have me here, isn’t it?”

  “Tell me what happened,” Finn said again.

  The boy shook his head and craned his neck, looking behind him toward the counter. “You don’t need to use any of that stuff. I’ll tell you what you need to know. I’ll tell you whatever you want to hear.”

  “What I want to hear is what happened,” Finn said.

  “I… I got caught up in the crowd. We all did. When the protests came through, we sort of slipped into it. They were heading out to the old temple in the Brinder section. It’s a small building, a place where the ancients celebrated the old gods.”

  Finn stared at him.

  This was a different killing. One he hadn’t heard about before.

  The protests had persisted, despite the king increasing the Archer presence in the city. There was a limit to how long everything would simmer before it fully exploded.

  Another Archer dying…

  Gods. What’s going to happen now?

  Finn knew the place. And it was more than just an old temple where the old gods were celebrated. It was a place of the Alainsith. There were many places like that throughout the city.<
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  “And?”

  “And everything sort of got chaotic. A building nearby was burning. We were shouting. And then the Archers came. I threw something. Didn’t see where I threw it, or what I threw it at, but they tell me that it hit one of the Archers on the head, and it… it killed him.” His voice trailed off at the end, though he had been speaking quickly, almost as if to get out everything as fast as he could. “I didn’t mean to kill one of the Archers,” Walter said. “I was just caught up.”

  “How many were with you?”

  “How many what?”

  “Protesters?” Finn asked.

  “There were a bunch of them. The streets were filled. Never seen anything like it. Not too many people want to come into the Brinder section. Those who do usually want to get out, you know?”

  “Yes,” Finn said.

  “Anyway,” Walter said, looking up at him and holding his gaze. “I just went along. I mean, who wouldn’t want to go along when they are demanding more? I want the same thing as everybody wants. I want to make it out of my section. I never wanted to hurt anyone, though,” he said, his voice dropping to a whisper.

  Finn sighed. He pushed the stool back, placing it along the wall, and glanced over to the tools. None of them would be needed.

  Worse, nothing this boy knew would help Finn understand what had been taking place in the city. He was just one more person who’d gotten caught up in the current, a pebble washed along in the stream of people.

  “You will be brought before the jurors. They will decide your fate,” Finn said.

  “What’s going to happen to me?”

  Finn wished he could tell the boy anything but the truth. “If you didn’t hit the Archer, you’ll be fine, but if you killed him, then you’ll likely be sentenced to hang.”

  Walter started whimpering.

  “I’m sorry.”

  He stared at the boy for a moment and realized just how similar his experience was to Finn’s. Had Finn been in the Brinder section under similar circumstances, wouldn’t he have done something like that?

  Finn couldn’t deny that he would. He knew the kinds of things he would’ve done, knew how he had felt—and he knew he would have been just as likely to have thrown a rock, trying to rage at his place in the world.