Retribution

Bones

Our pace slowed up as the building came into sight. A large, rectangular stone construct, with three wide chimneys and surrounded by workshop detritus, it had been built into a small gully, with a river running along the bottom.

But while the soldiers fanned out, with a section moving around the other side of the building, something didn’t quite feel right.

The stench.

It was the odour that put me off. ‘Leana,’ I called, and she froze too. ‘Do you smell that?’

She nodded, her eyes widening, and moved to say something, but another of the scouts came to find me again. ‘Sir, we’ve found something,’ she announced, her face grim. ‘You’d better come this way.’

We trotted behind her, following a narrow path through discarded crates, waste and long grasses, until we arrived at a field at the back of the building.

Because of the bright moon, the tiny, jutting bones could still be perceived.

There must have been two dozen corpses in this field, half-heartedly dug into the ground.

‘Bring torches,’ I called, and when no one replied I shouted the order again, almost losing my voice.

Light came. Things glistened, but there was no longer any pink flesh here. Charred skin and small, blackened skulls, hollow eyes amidst the stems of rye grass. We were walking among the foetid bones of dead children.

‘Spirits save them,’ Leana breathed. ‘They are all so young.’

‘Why have they killed them?’

‘That is why,’ Leana replied, pointing to the corner of the field. There, glinting dully in the moonlight, was a large brass statue of a bull — one similar to statues I had seen at Lydia Marinus’ house. Once it had been heated by a huge pyre, which was now a smouldering pile of ash. The statue must have been fifteen feet tall, and at least thirty feet long.

‘The old ways,’ I remarked.

We moved over quickly, whereupon I instructed a dozen men to look inside the structure. They obliged, first cautiously touching the statue to see if it was still hot.

‘It’s safe to touch, but hasn’t long gone out,’ someone said. ‘Seems a hasty business.’

Rope was tossed up and, when it had hooked securely, three soldiers climbed to the top of the statue. One by one they peered inside. One of them collapsed off the side, falling into the long grass. Another retched the contents of his stomach down the side of the statue. The reaction was enough to confirm the worst.

More torches were brought to the scene.

‘Describe what you can see inside,’ I called up.

The man peered over the edge once again but said nothing.

‘What can you see?’ I called again.

‘B-bodies, sir,’ he replied. Then, more firmly, ‘Two of them. Remains. Children’s remains.’

‘By Polla. .’ I breathed, rubbing my eyes. ‘What have we stumbled onto?’

‘It’s hideous,’ Sulma Tan replied. There were tears in her eyes. There were probably some in my own, too.

‘Child sacrifice,’ Leana muttered. ‘Such desperation to please the old gods.’

I grabbed one of the torches from a soldier, who stood agape, and wandered off into the field of broken young bodies.

Some of these could have been no older than two or three summers. Others were perhaps in their teenage years, but it did not detract from the crime. Even if these were adults, I would have been horrified, but to kill them at such a young age and on such a scale.

And for what reason? Were these not the workers?

Some of the corpses were very fresh — and had not been burned, though their naked bodies displayed ritualistic torture — icons had been burned into their skin, and there were cuts across their wrists and throats. The nearest one that had not been charred, whose throat had been cut, still had its eyes open to the world.

I moved the torch over his face and looked into that lifeless gaze — two blue eyes regarded me, very much dead, but still with the power to move me.

Dawn broke across the field, gradually illuminating the full extent of the horrors. I counted forty-three in all, but guessed there were many more underground elsewhere. This was a graveyard for burned and broken lives. Many had clearly been sacrificed, according to the old ways. But in all my years I had never known victims to be so young. Everyone had heard tales from thousands of years ago, when cultures would conduct such barbaric practices to appease deities. Parents would even offer up their own children for favours. It had not so much been immoral then, as amoral. These beliefs were outside of our way of thinking. To see such an atrocity in our age, however, was chilling.

The command had been given for the soldiers to move on to see if there was anyone still alive, workers or children.

The rest of us simply stood in an adjacent field, trying to piece together what might have gone on, wondering how it was possible that so many young people could be eliminated. How many future craftsmen, artists, bakers, dancers, chariot racers — just how many of these children had been turned completely or partly to ash?

Later, much later, as the sun reached its zenith, there was a sign from a small pocket of soldiers. A signal came down from a grassy hillside that they had caught several men.

About an hour later, these prisoners were being marched down the slope where they were forced to kneel in front of the large stone building, their hands on their heads, facing the wall.

Satisfied these prisoners were under control, two of the soldiers dressed in blue and black approached me.

‘Found them in a small shack on the other side of the island, sir,’ said a tall officer. ‘There’s a bigger operation down there — just the mineral, though. Rock processing. There’s a small jetty where the mineral is shipped from.’

‘Are there any documents? Is there any evidence?’

‘Burned.’

‘They must have seen our ship coming,’ I replied, ‘and tried to conceal what was here.’

‘Aye. They smell of fires, the lot of them. Most likely they burned these kids too so we couldn’t find them.’

‘Do you have any idea how long it takes to burn a body?’ I said. ‘Those children were burned before we turned up. It takes a lot more people to do it, too. No doubt there are more hiding on the island somewhere. Find them. Leave these ones here.’

‘Sir.’

The soldiers followed my orders. I nodded to Leana and we both walked around the front, facing the eight men, who were a range of ages. The youngest no more than twenty summers, the oldest in his fifties, and each looked well fed. Their faces had been blackened by soot, and their clothing was stained beyond recognition. They held their heads low.

Barely able to hide my anger at the lack of humanity, I eventually composed myself and addressed them all.

‘My name,’ I began, shouting loudly above the wind, ‘is Lucan Drakenfeld. I am an Officer of the Sun Chamber, the highest legal authority in the Vispasian Royal Union.’

I repeated the statement in Kotonese.

‘You are all to be arrested and taken back to the mainland. Your crimes, if you are found responsible, will lead to your execution. I cannot guarantee it will be a quick death. You are likely to be subjected to a painful and humiliating end.’

Again, I repeated myself in the other language.

‘I will take you one by one to the adjacent field where so many bodies lie in various states of decomposition. You will have the opportunity to prove your innocence. By explaining what has gone on here, and who is responsible, there is a slender opportunity for mercy. I am not an unreasonable man.’ I gave a brief pause. ‘However, my assistant here is not so kind.’ Leana drew her sword, the blade glimmering in the morning sun. ‘Should you be. . unhelpful in any way, I cannot guarantee any of the laws of this continent will be adhered to, nor that your pain will be minimal. Having seen what’s happened here, I can’t say I care all that much. The choice, gentlemen, is yours.’

I pointed at the oldest man in the group. The soldiers dragged him into the field indelicately before they kicked him in the ribs.

Another soldier brought forward my travel case, containing paper and ink, and followed me into the field. There I set up my operation and began the afternoon-long process to find out the truth of what had happened here on Evum.