“Please,” Jeremee chokes out. “He’s only a child, a baby, truly. Please.”
Realization hits me. My genius twists inside my mind, desperate to get out, to stop this.Planes, no. No, please.
The Golden Whip.
After a hot, dry summer full of dead crops, my grandmother took the punishment for her field, according to my mother. She died after three lashes. How many can a child endure?
A shriek swells in my chest.
Jeremee drops to his knees of his own volition. “Please, he’s just a boy. Our parents are dead. The responsibility rests on my shoulders—”
The king tilts his head, listening.
“I beg you, punish me instead. I will take what he owes. I will give anything.”
The royal holds up his hand. “I have heard your points and agree you will receive the punishment. Your brother will know he is the reason for your suffering, and that will be his burden.”
Relief and terror seize me at once, like the heat and cold of a fever.
No,I think.No, I will. I will because Jeremee has given so much already. Jeremee has nothing left to give. He cannot keep giving.
“However,” the king says, “I’m not the one who was humiliated. Dominik?”
The silver-haired lord staggers to his feet several bodies ahead of me, brushing dirt off his clothes.
The king gestures. “You shall have to settle for the older of the two. What shall be the appropriate punishment for your debasement tonight?”
I do not see Dominik’s face, but I wonder if he has the gall to smile.
“Death,” he says.
No.Spittle sprays from my gritted teeth, a guttural growl ripping out. Tears blur my vision.
The king watches his friend, expression darkening. Finally, he speaks. “I’m a male of my word. A quick death it shall be. We will not offer the drawn-out suffering of the whip or the mines or the Walk.”
No!
Jeremee hangs his head. The king’s executioner steps away from Benji. The boy wails but, through the king’s power or his own fear, remains frozen in place. The cloaked figure strides before Jeremee.
“Blink,” the king whispers, and the room does. Only this time the anger leaves his face, leaving behind a grim expression. The king’s executioner does not reach for his sword. He places a hand on Jeremee’s forehead.
Blood fills my mouth, my tongue cut, my forehead pulsing with strain. The protest does nothing. Jeremee twists his neck, scanning the crowd. Our eyes meet and it is agony.
I’m here,I try to scream.I’m here. I love you. I—
Jeremee parts his lips, but it is too late. In a blink I cannot take, my best friend is rendered red mist.
He becomes nothing.
Nothing.
Not even a singular shoe remains.
No body to bury. No cold hand to hold.
Just one touch to the forehead and his entire existence is…Just. Gone.
Benji drops to the ground, wailing. No one moves, not even the king, as the child writhes and screams, his pain echoing in the otherwise silent, cavernous hall.
