The Gathandrian Trilogy 03 - The Executioners Cane

and she could not tell where it came from or what it meant. She only knew she felt she could do anything, and it was the mere fact of the cane held her back. It had caused too many tears in this land. She would make do only with her words, for now, which could never be piercing enough, by the stars. Later, she would do more, something within her whispered, but now was not the time for it.

    Simon

    Whoever Jemelda was, she had a great deal to say, and rightly so. While the cane remained in his grasp, Simon could feel the waves of her anger flooding over him like the wildest river in its fullest rage. All the colours of red and orange and the deepest black flowed round him. He felt as if he would drown if he so much as lost his footing. He wanted to run but the cane and the bird kept him there. Such depth and heat of fury was beyond what even he had expected and he couldn’t understand how the woman facing him could contain these levels of hatred and power.
    Of course he had expected anger from these people, but, by the gods and stars, nothing like this. Had he underestimated the experiences of the Lammassers and the wrong he had done them so very greatly? She had, he suspected, only just commenced the true depths of her accusations when a thin, shadowy figure appeared from behind her as if from nowhere. Frankel was the name that coloured his mind in soft shades of blue and mauve. An old man, who seemed as if he could at any moment collapse to the ground and stay there. How Simon understood that.
    At his side, the raven launched itself into the air. He had no idea what the great bird might do. He stumbled to his knees.
    “Please,” he whispered, though he had no idea whether he was begging the angry woman, the frail man, the bird or indeed something else entirely. “Please, I’m sorry …”
    The woman fell silent at once and the cane flashed green and yellow in his hands. Then it too returned to its customary state, and the bird alighted on the ground a little way off and cocked his head, viewing the encounter. The man called Frankel spoke.
    “What do you want here, Simon the Scribe?” he asked.
    Jemelda made as if to step forward, perhaps punish him physically in some way, but Frankel laid a hand on her shoulder and she merely grimaced.
    “What do you want?” Frankel said again.
    In truth, Simon wondered. He had come here with such confidence, such purpose which had seemed so right to him at the time – but now his ideas and hopes resembled nothing so much as leaves on the wind.
    “I-I don’t know,” he stuttered. “I wanted to put things right. I’m sorry.”
    Another silence, and he wished he’d never had the courage to come. He gripped the mind-cane more firmly but no help came from there.
    Jemelda’s lips moved, and Simon held his breath, bracing himself for yet another torrent of abuse he undoubtedly deserved. This however did not arrive. Instead the cook twisted her mouth further and spat directly at him. Her aim was good. Her saliva hit him on the right cheek, just below his eye, and flowed downwards towards his chin.
    “ Murderer,” she said again, turned on her heels and marched back into the part of the castle she had appeared from. The kitchen, Simon knew, though he had never physically been there. Had never, when he was Lord Tregannon’s companion, needed to.
    Frankel sighed.
    Simon rose to his feet. He stopped looking at the doorway where Jemelda had disappeared and gazed at the cook’s husband instead. His figure and hair were a study of age and greyness, but the colours of his mind folded over Simon’s and were, as he had sensed before, made up of the softness of blue and mauve. For a moment, the Lost One closed his eyes and felt their refreshment on his skin.
    When he opened them again, his vision was blurred, but he did not raise a hand either to wipe away his tears or the spittle on his face.
    “Thank you,” he said.
    Frankel shook his head. “I have done nothing, scribe, but you have done too much, and yet you still come to us.”
    “I am sorry.”
    “So you say, again. Yet my wife is right in her beliefs – your sorrow cannot help us. Not now and perhaps not ever. This land is marked for destruction and loss because of you. The gods and stars have made that clear.”
    “Yes, I know it. I am … no matter. You know what I would say already. But surely if I do not even try to correct what I have done wrong in some measure, then the gods and stars have every right to