Kurou Rukh
Almost 200 Years Later
Day 1
Hot day for an execution, Kurou Rukh mused as he pulled off his red cap and dabbed his brow. A wisp of sandalwood smoke blew past, momentarily sweetening the greasy odor of fried crickets that arose from the food-wallahs’ carts. The two ash-covered human ascetics burning the incense looked comfortable enough, squatting in the scaffold’s shadow wearing nothing but white dhotis. Kurou tugged on his uniform collar with envy. The vine-covered arches over Lamentation Square provided shade but did nothing to lessen the humidity.
A lateni broadsheet hawker paused, digging into sur small crossbody pouch to dig out a few small coins for the ascetics’ begging bowls. The humans pressed their hands together in acknowledgement.
“I don’t understand why su’s paying them,” complained Kurou’s nephew, Jaiy. “We’re the ones doing all the work.”
“They’re working, in their own way.” Kurou settled his cap back over his short-cropped hair. “And Mother likes having them here.”
Next to him, Jaiy hunched his shoulders, muttering something that got lost under a sudden roar from the onlookers. The boy was in a mood, and Kurou didn’t have time for it now.
A moment later, Magister Dawa Gerent rode through the line of soldiers that formed a human barrier between the crowd and the scaffold. As Kurou stepped forward to greet him, Gerent reined in his saur and slid out of its gilded saddle, coughing. The agitated utaha scuttled back and forth, hissing and flapping its small, feathered forearms in protest. Kurou grabbed its bridle, holding it still.
“Good morning, Magister.” Hands occupied, Kurou was limited to making an awkward bow of respect.
Gerent gave a short nod, his gaunt frame wracked by liquid coughs as he leaned against the saur’s saddle horn. The sadhus gently wafted incense smoke toward them. Kurou didn’t think that was going to help, but it wasn’t his place to object.
After one last, painful cough, the invoker pushed himself upright. Like Kurou, he was overdressed for the heat, obliged by duty to present himself in courtly attire. His lank black hair spilled over his shoulders, held away from his face by jeweled clips, and sweat gleamed wherever his dark skin wasn’t covered by the dry, flaking blue scales of his honormarks.
“Rukh,” Gerent tucked his bloodstained handkerchief into one sleeve and glanced up at the scaffold. “Last one.”
“Yes, sir.” Kurou had a feeling that Magister Gerent would be as happy as he was to see the end of this set of executions. The invoker had been obliged to attend the last two as the raja’s representative, despite his failing health.
Nearby, somebody’s radio burst into static. Indira Rayen’s familiar voice emerged from the crackling: “— I can see the tumbril approaching now — constables are pushing back against the crowds that are shouting and throwing garbage at Taim Scandha —”
Citta Radio was broadcasting from its usual mobile post over the Bitter Cup, on the far side of the Square, which meant the tumbril was close.
“— if they aren’t careful,” she continued, “they’re going to hit the Al-Nathapala, who’s walking next to the wagon —”
“That’s why I rode ahead.” Gerent’s thin lips twisted up into a tight but conspiratorial smile. Kurou risked the tiniest smile in return as the invoker turned toward the scaffold. Leaning heavily on the railing, Gerent began his laborious climb up its stone steps.
Shaking his head, Kurou hitched the magister’s saur to one of the big metal rings set into the scaffold’s stone legs. The raja really ought to retire Gerent soon, he mused, not for the first time. When the invoker had first arrived in Katakot, he’d been a strong young man, his bright blue honormarks fresh and smooth. But nine years of manipulating the chirate for a querulous and demanding ruler had taken its toll, the toxic power slowly devouring Gerent from the inside out. Kurou wondered if the invoker considered the price worth the reward.
“— thanaturgy and treason —” The rest of Rayen’s words were lost in another burst of static. He shrugged off his thoughts and turned toward Jaiy.
“Go put some water next to the magister,” he ordered. His nephew grumbled as he turned away. Kurou decided to let it go and turned toward the crowd, reflexively smoothing his uniform jacket.
The townsfolk pressing against the soldier’s line around the scaffold were mostly human, lower-class, and plainskin, much like him. Here and there, Kurou spotted human and lateni Devoted, their brows painted, their hands holding meditation malas as they stood in silent reminder that Caretaker Nathapala objected to execution. The crowd generally gave them space, either out of respect or, perhaps, embarrassment.
More well-to-do viewers had rented windows in the buildings around the square or had chosen to sit in the line of brightly painted, discreetly covered rickshaws around the edge of the Square. He wondered whether Mariya had managed to secure herself a window or a rickshaw seat for this job. He straightened slightly, just in case she was watching.
“Daddy, is that the Rukh?” The high-pitched voice carried over the hubbub around them. Kurou turned to see a plainskin child perched on her father’s shoulders, holding a skewer of fried crickets. She squealed with excitement when she saw Kurou’s genmarked eyes, pale blue with reptilian, vertical pupils, and drummed her heels on her father’s chest. A moment later the crowd shifted with a roar of triumph, and Kurou lost sight of her as the red-lacquered tumbril broke through the mob.
Captain Barak sat in front with the wagon driver, his carved bone cane laid across his legs and his brow furrowed. Kurou stepped out of the scaffold’s shadow as the bulky saur pulling the wagon came to a heavy halt, snorting and shaking its leathery, horned frill.
“Easy, friend,” he murmured, resting a soothing hand on the ceradha’s broad, sun-warmed muzzle. The saur rolled its visible eye at him, then dropped its head, scanning the street nearsightedly for something to eat.
“Well, here we go again.” Barak eased himself down the side of the wagon with a wince. “Let’s get this over with.” He limped to the back of the tumbril, pulling a ring of keys off his belt.
Kurou gave the elderly ceradha a final, affectionate pat and followed the captain, bowing as he passed the caretaker’s avatar, Nishita Al-Nathapala.
“Ready?” Captain Barak unlocked the back of the tumbril and Kurou reached in to grasp Taim Scandha’s arm, helping him out. Garbage pelted them all, an overripe plum striking Kurou’s hip and a taro root hitting the priest who followed Scandha. Kurou tightened his grip on the prisoner’s arm and scowled at the unruly crowd as a flash went off, nearly blinding him. The press loved to take photos of him when he was frowning. Scandha might be the villain of the day, but Kurou was Katakot’s favorite boogeyman.
A boogeyman, however, who’d done his best to talk his way out of this job. When Raja Bhattacharyya had condemned each member of Taim Scandha’s family to be immolated separately: one person a week for four consecutive weeks, Kurou had immediately sent the Court of Justice a cautious, politely worded objection. A single multiple hanging, he’d pointed out, would be faster, less dangerous, and less expensive than four individual immolations. However, he’d added respectfully, if the raja required that the Scandhas be immolated, the cemetery crematoria would be better-suited to the job than his scaffold; it would be easy enough to slide a prisoner into the ovens instead of a corpse. Easy, efficient, and much less messy than burning at the stake.
The justices had unanimously rejected his suggestion. The raja didn’t want efficiency — he wanted spectacle.
Be grateful, Kurou’s mother had said: he’d earn more money doing four immolations than one hanging. But Kurou hadn’t felt very grateful, scouring human ash out of his uniform after each of the last three executions. And he wasn’t feeling very grateful now, as he guided Scandha onto the platform.
At least the rukhs perched in the vine-covered scaffolding over Lamentation Square were happy, shrieking with anticipation and hopping from skull to skull. Kurou ignored his Family’s raucous namesakes as he handed Scandha to a constable. The rukhs were always excited when a crowd formed in the square; they associated crowds with feeding. The last three immolations had disappointed them, and they were destined to be disappointed again today.
Captain Barak took a deep breath, standing at the edge of the scaffold.
“For conspiracy and high treason against the most beloved and gracious recognized majesty Raja Chander Bhattacharyya,” he bellowed, “and for the assault, kidnapping, thanaturgic harrowing, and cold-blooded murder of his majesty’s only two sons, Prince Amrit and Prince Doran, the prisoner has….”
The crowd’s boos and hisses drowned out his words. When he finished, he stepped to one side of the scaffold, the opposite side from where Avatar Nishita stood silently and Magister Gerent coughed into his handkerchief.
Kurou cast one last look around. Jaiy stood beside the brazier with an unlit torch. The metal stake was in place, anchored half a meter behind the stone gallows pillar. The bundles of bamboo and dried grass piled around the stake gave off a pleasant scent. Kurou’s ladder and tool bag were neatly stacked to one side, out of the way until they would be needed. He nodded. His scaffold was as orderly as he could make it.
“Rukh!” Barak called. “Do your duty!”
Giving his uniforn jacket one last tug, Kurou strode across the iron-banded platform to face the prisoner. He pressed his palms together in front of him.
“Taim Scandha,” he said quietly, “I have been appointed by His Recognized Majesty Chander Bhattacharyya, the raja of Ojhasu si’Urai, protectorate of Caretaker Nathapala, to uphold the sentences and execute the law of His Majesty’s Court of Justice.” He pulled off his crimson cap and bowed. “I beg your forgiveness in the name of all of the gods, the spirits, and the raja.”
Taim Scandha said nothing. Kurou waited. The three previous Scandhas had spat and cursed. He’d expected the same today. At last, driven by curiosity, he glanced up. Scandha was smiling at him with a bright and terrible clarity.
Kurou’s eyes widened.
“He’s not dru—”
His warning was cut off as Scandha’s manacled hands darted up and clamped around his neck. A cold, sharp pain skewered him from sinuses to groin, and Kurou felt his fingers and toes go numb as Scandha’s iron chains crumbled into rust.
It’s chirate, he realized with horror. The nirmita bracelet squirmed around his wrist and slid over his palm, as if trying to get his attention. His fingers were too numb to close over it.
Scandha pulled him closer. Something sharp bit into Kurou’s neck.
“Got you, Rukh,” the prisoner hissed. Chiratial energy sliced through Kurou’s lungs and bowels like frozen knives.
The scaffold priest grabbed Scandha’s arm and yelped with pain, pulling his hand back.
“It’s thanaturgy!” the priest cried out with horror.
Scandha pressed his face closer, and Kurou inhaled the thanaturge’s sour breath and rancid prison stink. Blood trickled into his collar.
“You’re ours,” Scandha whispered in his ear. “Here, today, our pet monster. I hope it hurts like hell, you genmarked bastard. Remember me to the raja when you kill him.”
He opened his hand. Kurou’s knees buckled and he collapsed to the scaffold platform.
“Rukh!” Captain Barak shouted.
Kurou ground his forehead against the greasy, smoke-stained stone. His fingers and toes burned as their sensation returned. Jaiy’s hands grasped his shoulders and the nirmita bracelet fled back under his sleeve, spiraling up his arm as if to hide.
“Uncle! Uncle, are you all right?”
Kurou’s teeth chattered as his nephew dragged him into a sitting position. The heat from Jaiy’s fingers burned his cold flesh. Then a sharp crack rang across the scaffold. Scandha staggered.
“Jaiy — is he all right?” Barak demanded, brandishing his service revolver.
“I don’t know!” Jaiy patted Kurou’s cheek, his eyes wide. “Uncle! Talk to me!”
Kurou wanted to reassure him, but he couldn’t get his mouth and tongue to cooperate. Behind Jaiy’s back, Scandha grabbed the priest, who screamed. With a humorless laugh, the thanaturge took three fast steps forward, carrying the holy man with him. The soles of the priest’s sandals scrabbled a moment on the edge of the platform and then, with a wail, he lost his balance and plunged over the side.
Kurou drew in a sharp breath. With effort, he mustered the strength to look across the scaffold at Nishita. Was the tilt of the avatar’s head more saurian than usual? Was Caretaker Nathapala watching through Nishita’s golden eyes?
If xe was, the caretaker seemed content to wait.
Which meant, Kurou thought, that this was his responsibility. He dragged a knee beneath himself and tried to stand. Pins and needles ran through his legs and he collapsed. Jaiy’s arms closed under his to hold him steady. Kurou felt the nirmita bracelet slither across his shoulders and wrap around his neck. It stung for a moment and he shook his head to loosen it, then forgot about the device entirely as a constable charged Scandha with his talwar held high.
Scandha spun, his hand rising to block the curved blade. Blood sprayed across the scaffold’s flagstones as half of his fingers were sheared off. Without hesitating, the thanaturge dropped what remained of his hand onto the constable’s shoulder. The constable screamed, his skin ulcerating and turning black.
“Scandha, stop this now!” Magister Gerent’s voice rang across the scaffold.
The two masters of chirate locked gazes. Scandha opened his hand, letting the constable fall limp at his feet. The bullet hole in the front of his kurta didn’t seem to bother the thanaturge at all anymore, and no blood dripped from the healed stumps where his fingers had been.
“Why?” Scandha asked with mild curiosity. “You killed my wife and sons. It’s not as though I have anything left to lose.”
Kurou heard Jaiy breathe an oath. The executioner gritted his teeth and pulled his legs under him again.
“Listen to the magister, Scandha.” Captain Barak’s voice was hard as he pointed his service revolver at the thanaturge. “You can’t escape. There’s nowhere to go.”
Scandha bared teeth glistened crimson in the sun.
“I know I’m only delaying the inevitable, Captain. But I don’t have anything better to do right now than kill the people who murdered my family.”
Kurou pushed himself up. It hurt to move. His nephew’s hand slid under his elbow, supporting him.
Captain Barak’s finger tightened on the trigger. Scandha thrust out his mutilated hand and the pistol’s hammer fell with a dull, useless click. The captain swore, pulling the trigger again. It snapped off, covered with rust.
“Caretaker Nathapala?” Magister Gerent looked at Nishita, his voice sour. “Are you planning to do anything about this?”
“Dawa Gerent, Taim Scandha and his family were sentenced to death under human law, so this altercation legally falls under human business.” Nishita’s vocal cadence was no longer human. “Unless, as the raja’s appointed representative to this execution, you wish to cede this man’s sentence to me, I have insufficient reason to override the parameters of the Trust … despite my own preferences in the matter.”
Kurou flexed his hands as the caretaker spoke. The feeling was returning to his fingers. He touched his face. No lesions. Thank all the gods.
“You pathetic scalie,” Scandha sneered, his eyes on Gerent as he walked toward Captain Barak. Barak threw the broken pistol aside and raised his cane. “No choice but to ask your yakṣa master for orders?”
“Oh, for pity’s sake.” Gerent rolled his eyes. “You’re a Separatist, too?” With a wince, he crouched and rested blue-scaled fingers against the scaffold stone.
Kurou tumbled to all fours as the stone surface beneath his feet lurched to one side. The trapdoor under the gallows arm fell open, its suddenly rusty iron clasp torn from rotting wood. Nails shrieked as they twisted within the contorting, crumbling metal of the scaffold’s reinforcing bands. Scandha leaped away from the crack that opened between his feet, then dropped to his knees and slapped both palms against the scaffold. The stone shuddered and fell still. A wet, wracking cough wrenched from his lungs and droplets of blood spattered the stone in front of him.
“The problem with thanaturgy,” Gerent observed, “is that it doesn’t teach control.”
Scandha wiped his mouth, smearing blood across his face.
“I don’t expect to survive the day,” he snarled. “Do you?”
“I’ll survive you, at least,” Gerent replied in a dismissive tone.
“Won’t matter.” Scandha bared his bloody teeth in a fierce grin. “The princes are dead and the raja’s on his way. Or did you think his madness was natural?”
Kurou saw Gerent’s eyebrows arch as Captain Barak took the opportunity to snatch up the dead constable’s talwar.
“Captain, don’t!” Shaking off Jaiy’s hands, Kurou climbed to his feet. “Stay away from him!”
Scandha made a sound that might have been a laugh. Sores had opened around his mouth, and one of his eyes was burst-vessel crimson.
“Too late, Rukh,” the thanaturge mocked. With three fast steps forward, Scandha’s half-hand clamped down on Captain Barak’s sword-arm.
“No!” Kurou launched himself forward, yanking the woven mercy cord from his belt. Dodging around the struggling pair, he whipped the cord over the thanaturge’s head and jerked it tight around his neck. Scandha lost his grip on the captain, stumbling backward against Kurou’s chest as he clawed at the ligature.
Barak dropped to all fours, coughing. Kurou’s muscles strained as he pulled both ends of the red cord taut.
“Stop it!” he shouted in Scandha’s ear. “Leave him alone!”
Scandha reached up and gripped Kurou’s wrist, but before he could invoke, Kurou snapped his knee up between the prisoner’s legs. The angle from behind wasn’t perfect, but it was good enough to make Scandha release his grip.
Jaiy ran to Barak and snatched up the fallen talwar. “I got it!” he shouted. His eyes were wide as he looked at Kurou. “…D-do you want me to kill him?”
Scandha writhed against Kurou’s chest, trying to dig his fingernails under the strangling-cord. Kurou glanced uncertainly over the thanaturge’s shoulder to Magister Gerent.
“Sir?” he inquired.
Gerent looked at Nishita, whose expression remained dispassionate. With a shrug, the court invoker turned back to Kurou.
“Raja Bhattacharyya wants him burned, not strangled, Rukh.”
Kurou let one end of the cord slip through his fingers. Scandha fell to his knees and clutched his throat, fighting for breath. More blood streamed from his nostrils.
Risking a quick look around, Kurou saw Captain Barak groping for his bone cane, unsteady but alive. Jaiy was safe, too, still awkwardly brandishing the dead constable’s curved sword.
Thank you, Kurou breathed to any spirits or deities who might be listening. He tucked the mercy cord under his belt as the nirmita bracelet slithered from his neck to its usual place around his wrist.
“Straighten him up,” Gerent ordered. “Hold his head still.”
Kurou grabbed a handful of Scandha’s cheap prison kurta and pulled him upright. Gerent uncorked a gold-chased flask and held it against Scandha’s lips. The thanaturge jerked his face away, drooling blood and drug-laced liquor. Kurou laced his fingers through the prisoner’s hair and forced his head back until Scandha had no choice but to swallow.
“That’s enough.” Gerent stepped backward. Kurou released Scandha’s hair. The prisoner slumped forward, coughing and spitting.
“Doesn’t matter,” Scandha whispered hoarsely. “…Dirty yakṣa puppet.”
Gerent paid no attention, wiping off the mouth of his flask before recapping it.
Kurou looked around. Below the scaffold, almost all of the crowd had fled Lamentation Square, including the wealthy onlookers in their colorful rickshaws. A lateni Devoted stood along the edge of the square, calmly answering stragglers’ questions with rapid saursign. On the roof of the Bitter Cup, almost at his eye level, Citta Radio’s celebrity announcer Indira Rayen was speaking into a microphone. Kurou tightened his grip on Scandha’s shoulder and hoped that she hadn’t wire-recorded her broadcast. He took small solace in the fact that there were no cameras on the roof, although the print reporters next to Rayen were scribbling madly in their notebooks.
Magister Gerent’s voice broke his reverie. “Can you still work, Rukh?”
Kurou snapped back to attention.
“Yes, Magister.”
“Then finish this.”
“Yes, sir.” Kurou hauled Scandha back to his feet. Jaiy handed him his red cap, and Kurou set it on his head with his free hand, looking around. Cracked stone, rusted and buckled metal, spilled blood — his scaffold was a mess, he realized with dismay. And the structural damage wasn’t going to be cheap to repair. At least the metal stake on the far end of the platform remained intact.
“Let’s get to work,” he said, tersely.
Within minutes he and Jaiy had carried the reeling thanaturge to the stake and bound him. Scandha fought for each breath, his flesh disfigured by misshapen tumors and leaking sores. Kurou nervously glanced down at his own hands and wrists as he secured the ropes around Scandha’s arms. His skin was still whole. He sighed with relief.
Jaiy lit a new torch from the sadhus’ coals as a few subdued onlookers edged back into the square. Two humans from the Bitter Cup lifted the priest’s body onto a plank and carried it off. Still standing on the tavern’s flat roof, Rayen spoke to listeners throughout the capital city of Katakot and beyond its walls to the rest of si’Urai.
Kurou squatted, arranging bundles of bamboo around Scandha’s feet. He tried to respectfully focus on the moment — on the scent of the dried grass and the gravity of what he was about to do — but his attention kept slipping away.
The printers down in Chatri would already be setting the type for a new run of papers, he was sure. A scaffold drama like today’s might sell for years … which meant he’d be hearing about it for years. He imagined executioners across si’Urai listening to their radios and chuckling at his embarrassment. The Rukhs were the preeminent executioners in the Clear Nations. Prisoners weren’t supposed to get loose on their scaffolds. Scandha’s escape would undoubtedly make him the butt of his peers’ good-natured jokes for years to come.
Which will only harm your pride, he counseled himself firmly. The fact that you’re worrying about it at all means you needed this dose of humility. The gods provide.
“Uncle?” Jaiy handed him Scandha’s sheared-off fingers. Kurou placed them in the woodpile under Scandha’s feet and stood, forcibly shaking off his concerns.
“We’re ready, sir,” he said, turning to Magister Gerent.
“Proceed,” the invoker replied with a curt nod.
Kurou took the burning brand from his nephew and walked around the pyre, setting the bundles alight. Scandha hung limp and still against the metal pole. Unconscious or dead, Kurou thought. Heat beat against his face as the flames caught, and he threw the torch into the pyre. Scandha remained motionless as the flames grew, periodically popping in bright colors as the fire ignited some chemical deposit embedded in the vegetation. A good thing the raja isn’t here to complain that Scandha is getting off too easily.
A ragged cheer arose from the few remaining spectators. Nishita turned to go, inclining their head to Kurou. The simple courtesy meant that Caretaker Nathapala was still inhabiting the avatar, so Kurou made a deep bow as they walked down the stairs. Nishita seldom attended executions; as a rule, Caretaker Nathapala didn’t approve of anything that reduced the genetic diversity of the populations under his supervision. Kurou assumed they’d only attended this one because Taim Scandha had murdered the raja’s young, childless heirs; that was the sort of crime guaranteed to make a yakṣa despair.
“Everything’s done,” Jaiy reported, joining his uncle.
“Good.” Kurou remembered his nephew’s poise during the attack. “You did well today.”
Jaiy opened his mouth as if to say something and then shrugged, looking away. Scandha’s smoke drifted upward, adding a new layer of soot to the vines wrapped around the overhanging arches. The rukhs ignored it, hissing and chortling as they fixed their predatory gaze on the crackling body.
If he were in charge, Kurou thought, the tightness in his shoulders slowly relaxing, every execution would be a hanging. Hangings were quick, clean, and professional. Immolations, by comparison, were slow and crude and didn’t require any skill. Anybody could set a man on fire. And beheadings, although more technically challenging than immolations, were just as messy in their own way. Kurou didn’t understand why politicians kept insisting that executions be any more untidy than they had to be.
On the roof of the Bitter Cup, Indira Rayen lowered her microphone. Kurou waited until she glanced his way and gave a respectful bow. Rayen, the calm voice of Katakot’s state-owned radio, had always been objective about his work, and he appreciated it. The rogue radio stations, by contrast, usually criticized him, and the print press wrote any ridiculous thing they thought would sell papers. To make matters worse, his mother insisted on collecting any article that covered one of his executions, especially if it included his photograph. Sometimes he jotted exasperated notes in the margins so future generation of Rukhs wouldn’t believe everything they read.
Thinking of his mother, he glanced down at his tiny house on the corner of Lamentation Square. Its red-painted door was closed, but one of the window shutters had been opened. He hoped his mother hadn’t been watching, especially when the priest had been killed.
Nothing you can do about it, he reminded himself. He wrapped a hand around the nirmita bracelet. Grandmother always advised him to stop fretting about things that were out of his control. Keeping Taim Scandha drugged hadn’t been his responsibility, and neither was the priest’s death.
Still, maybe the sadhus could perform a purification ritual on the square, he mused. He might talk to them about it after the execution. It would make his mother feel better.
Captain Barak limped around the bonfire. His color had returned, but he leaned more heavily on his bone cane than usual.
“Are you all right?” Kurou asked.
“Fucking hope so. Felt like the bastard turned my lungs to ice. Couldn’t breathe for a moment.” Barak glared at the burning corpse. “You?”
“I feel better now,” Kurou said, flexing his fingers and glancing down one more time to make sure no lesions or tumors had suddenly appeared.
“Let’s hope Shivrant’s execution goes better than this shitfest.”
Jaiy’s head jerked around. “Shivrant’s sentence came through?”
“Last night,” the captain confirmed.
“But—”
Kurou touched his nephew’s shoulder.
“I read the order this morning,” he said to Barak as Jaiy bristled under his hand. “The raja’s request is complicated.”
“Well, the raja’s been in a pissy mood lately, in case you hadn’t noticed. Guess you’ll just have to do some real work for a change.”
Kurou grunted. Raja Bhattacharyya had been demanding more than enough work from his executioner over the last few months, and everyone on the scaffold knew it.
“But it’s not fair,” Jaiy protested, squirming out from beneath Kurou’s grip. “He didn’t do anything wrong!”
“Go check the fire, Jaiy,” Kurou ordered.
“But, Uncle, it’s not right. The caretaker should do something!”
“You heard him today — executions aren’t yakṣa business.” Kurou pointed to the fire. Jaiy scowled, then stomped off to check it.
“I thought executioners were supposed to stay out of politics,” Barak muttered.
“He spends too much time listening to the hotheads in Chatri.” Kurou sighed. “It’s going to get him into trouble someday.”
“Have you talked to him?”
“He doesn’t listen.”
Barak snorted. “Only because you won’t take a strap to his ass. You need to stop coddling that boy, Rukh.”
“Mother wouldn’t like it if I beat her grandchild,” Kurou pointed out. “And my sister would kill me. Jaiy’s her baby.”
“Is he going to help you with Shivrant?”
“I don’t think so.” Kurou watched his nephew slouch around the bonfire. Jaiy looked very young when he sulked. “Kushal asked me to keep him away from anything too awful. And he’s a Pujari, not a Rukh. He’ll never have to do anyone for high treason.”
“Might do him some good. Snap him out of his hero-worship.”
Kurou nodded, although he had no intention of changing his mind.
“So what does ‘complicated’ mean, anyway?” Barak asked after a moment.
“Hanging, evisceration, burning, and quartering. In that order.”
Barak pulled out his unlit pipe and chewed on the stem, thinking.
“You’re right,” he said at last. “Sounds complicated. Can you do it?”
Kurou rubbed his chest, where his leather jerkin covered the dharmachakra tattooed over his heart.
“Of course I can.”
“Good. Best to keep the raja happy and get through this as fast as we can.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“See you at dinner tonight?”
“Mother’s looking forward to it.”
“Then I’m off to the Keep. Some bastard’s going to swing for forgetting Scandha’s sedatives this morning.”
“I really don’t need the extra work, Captain.”
“Tch. You should be grateful to get something as easy as a hanging.” Barak limped away as Scandha’s body collapsed in a swirl of hot embers. Next to the fire, Jaiy kicked a few loose chunks of bamboo back into the flames.
“Rukh,” Magister Gerent said as he approached. Kurou pressed his hands together in a respectful bow.
“Yes, Magister?”
“What was Scandha saying to you, earlier?”
“I — I don’t remember exactly, sir.” Kurou didn’t think telling the court invoker that Scandha said anything about him killing the raja would be wise. “He was angry that I killed his family.”
“There’s blood on your neck.”
Surprised, Kurou touched his throat. Dried blood crumbled under his fingers. That must have been what had drawn the nirmita there, he thought.
“I don’t think it’s important,” he said, uncertainly.
“It doesn’t look like much more than a scratch. Are you in any pain?”
“It hurt when he harrowed me, but I feel all right now.” Kurou licked dry lips, looking down at himself and taking a quick mental inventory. “I have a headache.”
“He was quick to kill everyone else.” Gerent studied him. “I wonder why he left you alive. …Maybe you’re just lucky.”
“Yes, sir.” Kurou couldn’t meet the invoker’s eyes.
“In which case, so am I. The raja wouldn’t like it if I lost his last Rukh.”
“Er — yes, sir.” Kurou couldn’t tell from Gerent’s tone whether he was serious or joking.
“Check your scaffold when this is over,” Gerent ordered. “The chirate might have spared you, but it will have eaten away the mortar and metal braces. Replace everything as soon as you can.”
“Yes, sir.” Kurou fought to keep his expression impassive as the magister turned away. It would have to be done after Shivrant’s execution. He hoped the raja wouldn’t notice.
In the middle of the scaffold, the thanaturge’s charred corpse hissed and crackled, a dark lump wreathed in flames.