The Spine of the World

Chapter 13 PRISONER'S CARNIVAL

 
It was an hour of beatings and taunting, of eager peasants throwing rotten food and spitting in their faces.
It was an hour that Wulfgar didn't even register. The man was so far removed from the spectacle of Prisoner's Carnival, so well hidden within a private emotional place, a place created through the mental discipline that had allowed him to survive the torments of Errtu, that he didn't even see the twisted, perverted faces of the peasants or hear the magistrate's assistant stirring up the mob for the real show when Jharkheld joined them on the huge stage. The barbarian was bound, as were the other three, with his hands behind his back and secured to a strong wooden post. Weights were chained about his ankles and another one around his neck, heavy enough to bow the head of powerful Wulfgar.
He had recognized the crowd with crystalline clarity. The drooling peasants, screaming for blood and torture, the excited, almost elated, ogre guards working the crowd, and the unfortunate prisoners. He'd seen them for what they were, and his mind had transformed them into something else, something demonic, the twisted, leering faces of Errtu's minions, slobbering over him with their acidic drool, nipping at him with their sharpened fangs and horrid breath. He smelled the fog of Errtu's home again, the sulphuric Abyss burning his nostrils and his throat, adding an extra sting to all of his many, many wounds. He felt the itching of the centipedes and spiders crawling over and inside his skin. Always on the edge of death. Always wishing for it.
As those torments had continued, day after week after month, Wulfgar had found his escape in a tiny corner of his consciousness. Locked inside, he was oblivious to his surroundings. Here at the carnival he went to that place.
One by one the prisoners were taken from the posts and paraded about, sometimes close enough to be abused by the peasants, other times led to instruments of torture. Those included cross ties for whipping; a block and tackle designed to hoist victims into the air by a pole lashed under their arms locked behind their back; ankle stocks to hang prisoners upside down in buckets of filthy water, or, in the case of unfortunate Creeps Sharky, a bucket of urine. Creeps cried through most of it, while Tee-a-nicknick and Wulfgar stoically accepted whatever punishment the magistrate's assistant could dish out without a sound other than the occasional, unavoidable gasp of air being blasted from their lungs. Morik took it all in stride, protesting his innocence and throwing witty comments about, which only got him beaten all the worse.
Magistrate Jharkheld appeared, entering to howls and cheers, wearing a thick black robe and cap, and carrying a silver scroll tube. He moved to the center of the stage, standing between the prisoners to eye them deliberately one by one.
Jharkheld stepped out front. With a dramatic flourish he presented the scroll tube, the damning documents, bringing eager shouts and cheers. Each movement distinct, with an appropriate response mounting to a crescendo, Jharkheld popped the cap from the tube's end and removed the documents. Unrolling them, the magistrate showed the documents to the crowd one at a time, reading each prisoner's name.
The magistrate surely seemed akin to Errtu, the carnival barker, ordering the torments. Even his voice sounded to the barbarian like that of the balor: grating, guttural, inhuman.
"I shall tell to you a tale," Jharkheld began, "of treachery and deceit, of friendship abused and murder attempted for profit. That man!" he said powerfully, pointing to Creeps Sharky, "that man told it to me in full, and the sheer horror of it has stolen my sleep every night since." The magistrate went on to detail the crime as Sharky had presented it. All of it had been Morik's idea, according to the wretch. Morik and Wulfgar had lured Deudermont into the open so that Tee-a-nicknick could sting him with a poisoned dart. Morik was supposed to sting the honorable captain, too, using a different variety of poison to ensure that the priests could not save the man, but the city guard had arrived too quickly for that second assault. Throughout the planning, Creeps Sharky had tried to talk them out of it, but he'd said nothing to anyone else out of fear of Wulfgar. The big man had threatened to tear his head from his shoulders and kick it down every street in Luskan.
Enough of those gathered in the crowd had fallen victim to Wulfgar's enforcer tactics at the Cutlass to find that last part credible.
"You four are charged with conspiracy and intent to heinously murder goodman Captain Deudermont, a visitor in excellent standing to our fair city," Jharkheld said when he completed the story and let the howls and jeers from the crowd die away. "You four are charged with the infliction of serious harm to the same. In the interest of justice and fairness, we will hear your answers to these charges."
He walked over to Creeps Sharky. "Did I relate the tale as you told it to me?" he asked.
"You did sir, you did," Creeps Sharky eagerly replied. "They done it, all of it!"
Many in the crowd yelled out their doubts about that, while others merely laughed at the man, so pitiful did he sound.
"Mister Sharky," Jharkheld went on, "do you admit your guilt to the first charge?"
"Innocent!" Sharky protested, sounding confident that his cooperation had allowed him to escape the worst of the carnival, but the jeers of the crowd all but drowned out his voice.
"Do you admit your guilt to the second charge against you?"
"Innocent!" the man said defiantly, and he gave a gap-toothed smile to the magistrate.
"Guilty!" cried an old woman. "Guilty he is, and deserving to die horrible for trying to blame the others!"
A hundred cries arose agreeing with the woman, but Creeps Sharky held fast his smile and apparent confidence. Jharkheld walked out to the front of the platform and patted his hands in the air, trying to calm the crowd. When at last they quieted he said, "The tale of Creeps Sharky has allowed us to convict the others. Thus, we have promised leniency to the man for his cooperation." That brought a rumble of boos and derisive whistles. "For his honesty and for the fact that he, by his own words-undisputed by the others-was not directly involved."
"I'll dispute it!" Morik cried, and the crowd howled. Jharkheld merely motioned to one of the guards, and Morik got the butt of a club slammed into his belly.
More boos erupted throughout the crowd, but Jharkheld denied the calls and a smile widened on the face of clever Creeps Sharky.
"We promised him leniency," Jharkheld said, throwing up his hands as if there was nothing he could do about it. "Thus, we shall kill him quickly."
That stole the smile from the face of Creeps Sharky and turned the chorus of boos into roars of agreement.
Sputtering protests, his legs failing him, Creeps Sharky was dragged to a block and forced to kneel before it.
"Innocent I am!" he cried, but his protest ended abruptly as one of the guards forced him over the block, slamming his face against the wood. A huge executioner holding a monstrous axe stepped up to the block.
"The blow won't fall clean if you struggle," a guard advised him.
Creeps Sharky lifted his head. "But ye promised me!"
The guards slammed him back down on the block. "Quit yer wiggling!" one of them ordered. The terrified Creeps jerked free and fell to the platform, rolling desperately. There was pandemonium as the guards grabbed at him. He kicked wildly, the crowd howled and laughed, and cries of "Hang him!" "Keel haul!" and other horrible suggestions for execution echoed from every corner of the square.
*****
"Lovely gathering," Captain Deudermont said sarcastically to Robillard. They stood with several other members of Sea Sprite among the leaping and shouting folk.
"Justice," the wizard stated firmly.
"I wonder," the captain said pensively. "Is it justice, or entertainment? There is a fine line, my friend, and considering this almost daily spectacle, it's one I believe the authorities in Luskan long ago crossed."
"You were the one who wanted to come here," Robillard reminded him.
"It is my duty to be here in witness," Deudermont answered.
"I meant here in Luskan," Robillard clarified. "You wanted to come to this city, Captain. I preferred Waterdeep."
Deudermont fixed his wizard friend with a stern stare, but he had no rebuttal to offer.
*****
"Stop yer wiggling!" the guard yelled at Creeps, but the dirty man fought all the harder, kicking and squealing desperately. He managed to evade their grasps for some time to the delight of the onlookers who were thoroughly enjoying the spectacle. Creeps's frantic movements brought his gaze in line with Jharkheld. The magistrate fixed him with a glare so intense and punishing that Creeps stopped moving.
"Draw and quarter him," Jharkheld said slowly and deliberately.
The gathering reached a new level of joyous howling.
Creeps had witnessed that ultimate form of execution only twice in his years, and that was enough to steal the blood from his face, to send him into a fit of trembling, to make him, right there in front of a thousand onlookers, wet himself.
"Ye promised," he mouthed, barely able to draw breath, but loud enough for the magistrate to hear and come over to him.
"I did promise leniency," Jharkheld said quietly, "and so I will honor my word to you, but only if you cooperate. The choice is yours to make."
Those in the crowd close enough to hear groaned their protests, but Jharkheld ignored them.
"I have four horses in waiting," Jharkheld warned.
Creeps started crying.
"Take him to the block," the magistrate instructed the guards. This time Creeps made no move against them, offered no resistance at all as they dragged him back, forced him into a kneeling position, and pushed his head down.
"Ye promised," Creeps softly cried his last words, but the cold magistrate only smiled and nodded. Not to Creeps, but to the large man standing beside him.
The huge axe swept down, the crowd gasped as one, then broke into howls. The head of Creeps Sharky tumbled to the platform and rolled a short distance. One of the guards rushed to it and held it up, turning it to face the headless body. Legend had it that with a perfect, swift cut and a quick guard the beheaded man might still be conscious for a split second, long enough to see his own body, his face contorted into an expression of the purest, most exquisite horror.
Not this time, though, for Creeps Sharky wore the same sad expression.
*****
"Beautiful," Morik muttered sarcastically at the other end of the platform. "Yet, it's a better fate by far than the rest of us will find this day."
Flanking him on either side, neither Wulfgar nor Tee-a-nicknick offered a reply.
"Just beautiful," the doomed rogue said again. Morik was not unaccustomed to finding himself in rather desperate situations, but this was the first time he ever felt himself totally without options. He shot Tee-a-nicknick a look of utter contempt then turned his attention to Wulfgar. The big man seemed so impassive and distanced from the mayhem around them that Morik envied him his oblivion.
The rogue heard Jharkheld's continuing banter as he worked up the crowd. He apologized for the rather unentertaining execution of Creeps Sharky, explaining the occasional need for such mercy. Else, why would anyone ever confess?
Morik drowned out the magistrate's blather and willed his mind to a place where he was safe and happy. He thought of Wulfgar, of how, against all odds, they had become friends. Once they had been rivals, the new barbarian rising in reputation on Half-Moon Street, particularly after he had killed the brute, Tree Block Breaker. The only remaining operator with a reputation to protect, Morik had considered eliminating Wulfgar, though murder had never really been the rogue's preferred method.
Then there had come the strangest of encounters. A dark elf-a damned drow!-had come to Morik in his rented room, had just walked in without warning, and had bade Morik to keep a close watch over Wulfgar but not to hurt the man. The dark elf had paid Morik well. Realizing that gold coins were better payment than the sharpened edge of drow weapons, the rogue had gone along with the plan, watching Wulfgar more and more closely as the days slipped past. They'd even becoming drinking partners, spending late nights, often until dawn, together at the docks.
Morik had never heard from that dark elf again. If the order had come from for him to eliminate Wulfgar, he doubted he would have accepted the contract. He realized now that if he heard the dark elves were coming to kill the barbarian, Morik would have stood by Wulfgar.
Well, the rogue admitted more realistically, he might not have stood beside Wulfgar, but he would have warned the barbarian, then run far, far away.
Now there was nowhere to run. Morik wondered briefly again if those dark elves would show up to save this human in whom they had taken such an interest. Perhaps a legion of drow warriors would storm Prisoner's Carnival, their fine blades slicing apart the macabre onlookers as they worked their way to the platform.
The fantasy could not hold, for Morik knew they would not be coming for Wulfgar. Not this time.
"I am truly sorry, my friend," he apologized to Wulfgar, for Morik could not dismiss the notion that this situation was largely his fault.
Wulfgar didn't reply. Morik understood that the big man had not even heard his words, that his friend was already gone from this place, fallen deep within himself.
Perhaps that was the best course to take. Looking at the sneering mob, hearing Jharkheld's continuing speech, watching the headless body of Creeps Sharky being dragged across the platform, Morik wished that he, too, could so distance himself.
*****
The magistrate again told the tale of Creeps Sharky, of how these other three had conspired to murder that most excellent man, Captain Deudermont. Jharkheld made his way over to Wulfgar. He looked at the doomed man, shook his head, then turned back to the mob, prompting a response.
There came a torrent of jeers and curses.
"You are the worst of them all!" Jharkheld yelled in the barbarian's face. "He was your friend, and you betrayed him!"
"Keel haul 'im on Deudermont's own ship!" came one anonymous demand.
"Draw and quarter and feed 'im to the fishes!" yelled another.
Jharkheld turned to the crowd and lifted his hand, demanding silence, and after a bristling moment they obeyed. "This one," the magistrate said, "I believe we shall save for last."
That brought another chorus of howls.
"And what a day we shall have," said Jharkheld, the showman barker. "Three remaining, and all of them refusing to confess!"
"Justice," Morik whispered under his breath.
Wulfgar stared straight ahead, unblinkingly, and only thoughts of poor Morik held him from laughing in Jharkheld's ugly old face. Did the magistrate really believe that he could do anything to Wulfgar worse than the torments of Errtu? Could Jharkheld produce Catti-brie on the stage and ravish her, then dismember her in front of Wulfgar, as Errtu had done so many times? Could he bring in an illusionary Bruenor and bite through the dwarf's skull, then use the remaining portion of the dwarf's head as a bowl for brain stew? Could he inflict more physical pain upon Wulfgar than the demon who had practiced such torturing arts for millennia? At the end of it all, could Jharkheld bring Wulfgar back from the edge of death time and again so that it would begin anew?
Wulfgar realized something profound and actually brightened. This was where Jharkheld and his stage paled against the Abyss. He would die here. At last he would be free.
*****
Jharkheld ran from the barbarian, skidding to a stop before Morik and grabbing the man's slender face in his strong hand, turning Morik roughly to face him. "Do you admit your guilt?" he screamed.
Morik almost did it, almost screamed out that he had indeed conspired to kill Deudermont. Yes, he thought, a quick plan formulating in his mind. He would admit to the conspiracy, but with the tattooed pirate only, trying to somehow save his innocent friend.
His hesitation cost him the chance at that time, for Jharkheld gave a disgusted snort and snapped a backhanded blow across Morik's face, clipping the underside of the rogue's nose, a stinging technique that brought waves of pain shifting behind Morik's eyes. By the time the man blinked away his surprise and pain, Jharkheld had moved on, looming before Tee-a-nicknick.
"Tee-a-nicknick," the magistrate said slowly, emphasizing every syllable, his method reminding the gathering of how strange, how foreign, this half-man was. "Tell me, Tee-a-nicknick, what role did you play?"
The tattooed half-qullan pirate stared straight ahead, did not blink, and did not speak.
Jharkheld snapped his fingers in the air, and his assistant ran out from the side of the platform, handing Jharkheld a wooden tube.
Jharkheld publicly inspected the item, showing it to the crowd. "With this seemingly innocent pole, our painted friend here can blow forth a dart as surely as an archer can launch an arrow," he explained. "And on that dart, the claw of a small cat, for instance, our painted friend can coat some of the most exquisite poisons. Concoctions that can make blood leak from your eyes, bring a fever so hot as to turn your skin the color of fire, or fill your nose and throat with enough phlegm to make every breath a forced and wretched-tasting labor are but a sampling of his vile repertoire."
The crowd played on every word, growing more disgusted and angry. Master of the show, Jharkheld measured their response and played to them, waiting for the right moment.
"Do you admit your guilt?" Jharkheld yelled suddenly in Tee-a-nicknick's face.
The tattooed pirate stared straight ahead, did not blink, and did not speak. Had he been full-blooded qullan, he might have cast a confusion spell at that moment, sending the magistrate stumbling away, baffled and forgetful, but Tee-a-nicknick was not pure blooded and had none of the innate magical abilities of his race. He did have qullan concentration, though, a manner, much like Wulfgar's, of removing himself from the present scene before him.
"You shall admit all," Jharkheld promised, wagging his finger angrily in the man's face, unaware of the pirate's heritage and discipline, "but it will be too late."
The crowd went into a frenzy as the guards pulled the pirate free of his binding post and dragged him from one instrument of torture to another. After about half an hour of beating and whipping, pouring salt water over the wounds, even taking one of Tee-a-nicknick's eyes with a hot poker, the pirate still showed no signs of speaking. No confession, no pleading or begging, hardly even a scream.
Frustrated beyond endurance, Jharkheld went to Morik just to keep things moving. He didn't even ask the man to confess. In fact he slapped Morik viciously and repeatedly every time the man tried to say a word. Soon they had Morik on the rack, the torturer giving the wheel a slight, almost imperceptible (except to the agonized Morik) turn every few minutes.
Meanwhile, Tee-a-nicknick continued to bear the brunt of the torment. When Jharkheld went to him again, the pirate couldn't stand, so the guards pulled him to his feet and held him.
"Ready to tell me the truth?" Jharkheld asked.
Tee-a-nicknick spat in his face.
"Bring the horses!" the magistrate shrieked, trembling with rage. The crowd went wild. It wasn't often that the magistrate went to the trouble of a drawing and quartering. Those who had witnessed it boasted it was the greatest show of all.
Four white horses, each trailing a sturdy rope, were ridden into the square. The crowd was pushed back by the city guard as the horses approached the platform. Magistrate Jharkheld guided his men through the precise movements of the show. Soon Tee-a-nicknick was securely strapped in place, wrists and ankles bound one to each horse.
On the magistrate's signal, the riders nudged their powerful beasts, one toward each point on the compass. The tattooed pirate instinctively bunched up his muscles, fighting back, but resistance was useless. Tee-a-nicknick was stretched to the limits of his physical coil. He grunted and gasped, and the riders and their well-trained mounts kept him at the very limits. A moment later, there came the loud popping of a shoulder snapping out of joint; soon after one of Tee-a-nicknick's knees exploded.
Jharkheld motioned for the riders to hold steady, and he walked over to the man, a knife in one hand and a whip in the other. He showed the gleaming blade to the groaning Tee-a-nicknick, rolling it over and over before the man's eyes. "I can end the agony," the magistrate promised. "Confess your guilt, and I will kill you swiftly."
The tattooed half-qullan grunted and looked away. On Jharkheld's wave, the riders stepped their horses out a bit more.
The man's pelvis shattered, and how he howled at last! How the crowd yelled in appreciation as the skin started to rip!
"Confess!" Jharkheld yelled.
"I stick him!" Tee-a-nicknick cried. Before the crowd could even groan its disappointment Jharkheld yelled, "Too late!" and cracked his whip.
The horses jumped away, tearing Tee-a-nicknick's legs from his torso. Then the two horses bound to the man's wrists had him out straight, his face twisted in the horror of searing agony and impending death for just an instant before quartering that portion as well.
Some gasped, some vomited, and most cheered wildly.
*****
"Justice," Robillard said to the growling, disgusted Deudermont. "Such displays make murder an unpopular profession."
Deudermont snorted. "It merely feeds the basest of human emotions," he argued.
"I don't disagree," Robillard replied. "I don't make the laws, but unlike your barbarian friend, I abide by them. Are we any more sympathetic to pirates we catch out on the high seas?"
"We do as we must," Deudermont argued. "We do not torture them to sate our twisted hunger."
"But we take satisfaction in sinking them," Robillard countered. "We don't cry for their deaths, and often, when we are in pursuit of a companion privateer, we do not stop to pull them from the sharks. Even when we do take them as prisoners, we subsequently drop them at the nearest port, often Luskan, for justice such as this."
Deudermont had run out of arguments, so he just stared ahead. Still, to the civilized and cultured captain's thinking, this display in no way resembled justice.
*****
Jharkheld went back to work on Morik and Wulfgar before the many attendants had even cleared the blood and grime from the square in front of the platform.
"You see how long it took him to admit the truth?" the magistrate said to Morik. "Too late, and so he suffered to the end. Will you be as much a fool?"
Morik, whose limbs were beginning to pull past the breaking point, started to reply, started to confess, but Jharkheld put a finger over the man's lips. "Now is not the time," he explained.
Morik started to speak again, so Jharkheld had him tightly gagged, a dirty rag stuffed into his mouth, another tied about his head to secure it.
The magistrate moved around the back of the rack and produced a small wooden box, the rat box it was called. The crowd howled its pleasure. Recognizing the horrible instrument, Morik's eyes popped wide and he struggled futilely against the unyielding bonds. He hated rats, had been terrified of them all of his life.
His worst nightmare was coming true.
Jharkheld came to the front of the platform again and held the box high, turning it slowly so that the crowd could see its ingenious design. The front was a metal mesh cage, the other three walls and the ceiling solid wood. The bottom was wooden as well, but it had a sliding panel that left an exit hole. A rat would be pushed into the box, then the box would be put on Morik's bared belly and the bottom door removed. Then the box would be lit on fire.
The rat would escape through the only means possible-through Morik.
A gloved man came out holding the rat and quickly got the boxed creature in place atop Morik's bared belly. He didn't light it then, but rather, let the animal walk about, its feet tapping on flesh, every now and then nipping. Morik struggled futilely.
Jharkheld went to Wulfgar. Given the level of excitement and enjoyment running through the mob, the magistrate wondered how he would top it all, wondered what he might do to this stoic behemoth that would bring more spectacle than the previous two executions.
"Like what we're doing to your friend Morik?" the magistrate asked.
Wulfgar, who had seen the bowels of Errtu's domain, who had been chewed by creatures that would terrify an army of rats, did not reply.
*****
"They hold you in the highest regard," Robillard remarked to Deudermont. "Rarely has Luskan seen so extravagant a multiple execution."
The words echoed in Captain Deudermont's mind, particularly the first sentence. To think that his standing in Luskan had brought this about. No, it had provided sadistic Jharkheld with an excuse for such treatment of fellow human beings, even guilty ones. Deudermont remained unconvinced that either Wulfgar or Morik had been involved. The realization that this was all done in his honor disgusted Deudermont profoundly.
"Mister Micanty!" he ordered, quickly scribbling a note he handed to the man.
"No!" Robillard insisted, understanding what Deudermont had in mind and knowing how greatly such an action would cost Sea Sprite, both with the authorities and the mob. "He deserves death!"
"Who are you to judge?" Deudermont asked.
"Not I!" the wizard protested. "Them," he explained, sweeping his arm out to the crowd.
Deudermont scoffed at the absurd notion.
"Captain, we'll be forced to leave Luskan, and we'll not be welcomed back soon," Robillard pointed out.
"They will forget as soon as the next prisoners are paraded out for their enjoyment, likely on the morrow's dawn." He gave a wry, humorless smile. "Besides, you don't like Luskan anyway."
Robillard groaned, sighed, and threw up his hands in defeat as Deudermont, too civilized a man, gave the note to Micanty and bade him to rush it to the magistrate.
*****
"Light the box!" Jharkheld called from the stage after the guards had brought Wulfgar around so that the barbarian could witness Morik's horror.
Wulfgar could not distance himself from the sight of setting the rat cage on fire. The frightened creature scurried about, and then began to burrow.
The scene of such pain inflicted on a friend entered into Wulfgar's private domain, clawed through his wall of denial, even as the rat bit through Morik's skin. The barbarian loosed a growl so threatening, so preternaturally feral, that it turned the eyes of those near him from the spectacle of Morik's horror. Huge muscles bunched and flexed, and Wulfgar snapped his torso out to the side, launching the man holding him there away. The barbarian lashed out with one leg, swinging the iron ball and chain so that it wrapped the legs of the other man holding him. A sharp tug sent the guard to the ground.
Wulfgar pulled and pulled as others slammed against him, as clubs battered him, as Jharkheld, angered by the distraction, yelled for Morik's gag to be removed. Somehow, incredibly, powerful Wulfgar pulled his arms free and lurched for the rack.
Guard after guard slammed into him. He threw them aside as if they were children, but so many rushed the barbarian that he couldn't beat a path to Morik, who was screaming in agony now.
"Get it off me!" cried Morik.
Suddenly Wulfgar was facedown. Jharkheld got close enough to snap his whip across the man's back with a loud crack!
"Admit your guilt!" the frenzied magistrate demanded as he beat Wulfgar viciously.
Wulfgar growled and struggled. Another guard tumbled away, and another got his nose splattered all over his face by a heavy slug.
"Get it off me!" Morik cried again.
The crowd loved it. Jharkheld felt certain he'd reached a new level of showmanship.
"Stop!" came a cry from the audience that managed to penetrate the general howls and hoots. "Enough!"
The excitement died away fast as the crowd turned and recognized the speaker as Captain Deudermont of Sea Sprite. Deudermont looked haggard and leaned heavily on a cane.
Magistrate Jharkheld's trepidation only heightened as Waillan Micanty pushed past the guards to climb onto the stage. He rushed to Jharkheld's side and presented him with Deudermont's note.
The magistrate pulled it open and read it. Surprised, stunned even, he grew angrier by the word. Jharkheld looked up at Deudermont, causally motioned for one of the guards to gag the screaming Morik again, and for the others to pull the battered Wulfgar up to his feet.
Unconcerned for himself and with no comprehension of what was happening beyond the torture of Morik, Wulfgar bolted from their grasp. He staggered and tripped over the swinging balls and chains but managed to dive close enough to reach out and slap the burning box and rat from Morik's belly.
He was beaten again and hauled before Jharkheld.
"It will only get worse for Morik now," the sadistic magistrate promised quietly, and he turned to Deudermont, a look of outrage clear on his face. "Captain Deudermont!" he called. "As the victim and a recognized nobleman, you have the authority to pen such a note, but are you sure? At this late hour?"
Deudermont came forward, ignoring the grumbles and protests, even threats, and stood tall in the midst of the bloodthirsty crowd. "The evidence against Creeps Sharky and the tattooed pirate was solid," he explained, "but plausible, too, is Morik's tale of being set up with Wulfgar to take the blame, while the other two took only the reward."
"But," Jharkheld argued, pointing his finger into the air, "plausible, too, is the tale that Creeps Sharky told, one of conspiracy that makes them all guilty."
The crowd, confused but suspecting that their fun might soon be at an end, seemed to like Magistrate Jharkheld's explanation better.
"And plausible, too, is the tale of Josi Puddles, one that further implicates both Morik the Rogue and Wulfgar," Jharkheld went on. "Might I remind you, Captain, that the barbarian hasn't even denied the claims of Creeps Sharky!"
Deudermont looked then to Wulfgar, who continued his infuriating, expressionless stance.
"Captain Deudermont, do you declare the innocence of this man?" Jharkheld asked, pointing to Wulfgar and speaking slowly and loudly enough for all to hear.
"That is not within my rights," Deudermont replied over the shouts of protest from the bloodthirsty peasants. "I cannot determine guilt or innocence but can only offer that which you have before you."
Magistrate Jharkheld stared at the hastily penned note again, then held it up for the crowd to see. "A letter of pardon for Wulfgar," he explained.
The crowd hushed as one for just an instant, then began jostling and shouting curses. Both Deudermont and Jharkheld feared that a riot would ensue.
"This is folly," Jharkheld snarled.
"I am a visitor in excellent standing, by your own words, Magistrate Jharkheld," Deudermont replied calmly. "By that standing I ask the city to pardon Wulfgar, and by that standing I expect you to honor that request or face the questioning of your superiors."
There it was, stated flatly, plainly, and without any wriggle room at all. Jharkheld was bound, Deudermont and the magistrate knew, for the captain was, indeed, well within his rights to offer such a pardon. Such letters were not uncommon, usually given at great expense to the family of the pardoned man, but never before in such a dramatic fashion as this. Not at the Prisoner's Carnival, at the very moment of Jharkheld's greatest show!
"Death to Wulfgar!" someone in the crowd yelled, and others joined in, while Jharkheld and Deudermont looked to Wulfgar in that critical time.
Their expressions meant nothing to the man, who still thought that death would be a relief, perhaps the greatest escape possible from his haunting memories. When Wulfgar looked to Morik, the man stretched near to breaking, his stomach all bloody and the guards bringing forth another rat, he realized it wasn't an option, not if the rogue's loyalty to him meant anything at all.
"I had nothing to do with the attack," Wulfgar flatly declared. "Believe me if you will, kill me if you don't. It matters not to me."
"There you have it, Magistrate Jharkheld," Deudermont said. "Release him, if you please. Honor my pardon as a visitor in excellent standing to Luskan."
Jharkheld held Deudermont's stare for a long time. The old man was obviously disapproving, but he nodded to the guards, and Wulfgar was immediately released from their grasp. Tentatively, and only after further prompting from Jharkheld, one of the men brought a key down to Wulfgar's ankles, releasing the ball and chain shackles.
"Get him out of here," an angry Jharkheld instructed, but the big man resisted the guards' attempts to pull him from the stage.
"Morik is innocent," Wulfgar declared.
"What?" Jharkheld exclaimed. "Drag him away!"
Wulfgar, stronger than the guards could ever imagine, held his ground. "I proclaim the innocence of Morik the Rogue!" he cried. "He did nothing, and if you continue here, you do so only for your own evil pleasures and not in the name of justice!"
"How much you two sound alike," an obviously disgusted Robillard whispered to Deudermont, coming up behind the captain.
"Magistrate Jharkheld!" the captain called above the cries of the crowd.
Jharkheld eyed him directly, knowing what was to come. The captain merely nodded. Scowling, the magistrate snapped up his parchments, waved angrily to his guards, and stormed off the stage. The frenzied crowd started pressing forward, but the city guard held them back.
Smiling widely, sticking his tongue out at those peasants who tried to spit at him, Morik was half dragged, half carried from the stage behind Wulfgar.
*****
Morik spent most of the walk through the magistrate offices talking soothingly to Wulfgar. The rogue could tell from the big man's expression that Wulfgar was locked into those awful memories again. Morik feared that he would tear down the walls and kill half the magistrate's assistants. The rogue's stomach was still bloody, and his arms and legs ached more profoundly than anything he had ever felt. He had no desire to go back to Prisoner's Carnival.
Morik thought they would be brought before Jharkheld. That prospect, given Wulfgar's volatile mood, scared him more than a little. To his relief, the escorting guards avoided Jharkheld's office and turned into a small, nondescript room. A nervous little man sat behind a tremendous desk littered with mounds of papers.
One of the guards presented Deudermont's note to the man. He took a quick look at it and snorted, for he had already heard of the disappointing show at Prisoner's Carnival. The little man quickly scribbled his initials across the note, confirming that it had been reviewed and accepted.
"You are not innocent," he said, handing the note to Wulfgar, "and thus are not declared innocent."
"We were told that we would be free to go," Morik argued.
"Indeed," said the bureaucrat. "Not really free to go, but rather compelled to go. You were spared because Captain Deudermont apparently had not the heart for your execution, but understand that in the eyes of Luskan you are guilty of the crime charged. Thus, you are banished for life. Straightaway to the gate with you, and if you are ever caught in our city again, you'll face Prisoner's Carnival one last time. Even Captain Deudermont will not be able to intervene on your behalf. Do you understand?"
"Not a difficult task," Morik replied.
The wormy bureaucrat glared at him, to which Morik only shrugged.
"Get them out of here," the man commanded. One guard grabbed Morik by the arm, the other reached for Wulfgar, but a shrug and a look from the barbarian had him thinking better of it. Still, Wulfgar went along without argument, and soon the pair were out in the sunshine, unshackled and feeling free for the first time in many days.
To their surprise, though, the guards did not leave them there, escorting them all the way to the city's eastern gate.
"Get out, and don't come back," one of them said as the gates slammed closed behind them.
"Why would I want to return to your wretched city?" Morik cried, making several lewd and insulting gestures at those soldiers staring down from the wall.
One lifted a crossbow and leveled it Morik's way. "Looky," he said. "The little rat's already trying to sneak back in."
Morik knew that it was time to leave, and in a hurry. He turned and started to do just that, then looked back to see the soldier, a wary look upon the man's grizzled face, quickly lower the bow. When Morik looked back, he understood, for Captain Deudermont and his wizard sidekick were fast approaching.
For a moment, it occurred to Morik that Deudermont might have saved them from Jharkheld only because he desired to exact a punishment of his own. That fear was short-lived, for the man strode right up to Wulfgar, staring hard but making no threatening moves. Wulfgar met his stare, neither blinking nor flinching.
"Did you speak truly?" Deudermont asked.
Wulfgar snorted, and it was obvious it was all the response the captain would get.
"What has happened to Wulfgar, son of Beornegar?" Deudermont said quietly. Wulfgar turned to go, but the captain rushed around to stand before him. "You owe me this, at least," he said.
"I owe you nothing," Wulfgar replied.
Deudermont considered the response for just a moment, and Morik recognized that the seaman was trying to see things from Wulfgar's point of view.
"Agreed," the captain said, and Robillard huffed in displeasure. "You claimed your innocence. In that case, you owe nothing to me, for I did nothing but what was right. Hear me out of past friendship."
Wulfgar eyed him coldly but made no immediate move to walk away.
"I don't know what has caused your fall, my friend, what has led you away from companions like Drizzt Do'Urden and Catti-brie, and your adoptive father, Bruenor, who took you in and taught you the ways of the world," the captain said. "I only pray that those three and the halfling are safe and well."
Deudermont paused, but Wulfgar said nothing.
"There is no lasting relief in a bottle, my friend," the captain said, "and no heroism in defending a tavern from its customary patrons. Why would you surrender the world you knew for this?"
Having heard enough, Wulfgar started to walk away. When the captain stepped in front of him again, the big man just pushed on by without slowing, with Morik scrambling to keep up.
"I offer you passage," Deudermont unexpectedly (even to Deudermont) called after him.
"Captain!" Robillard protested, but Deudermont brushed him away and scrambled after Wulfgar and Morik.
"Come with me to Sea Sprite," Deudermont said. "Together we shall hunt pirates and secure the Sword Coast for honest sailors. You will find your true self out there, I promise!"
"I would hear only your definition of me," Wulfgar clarified, spinning back and hushing Morik, who seemed quite enthralled by the offer, "and that's one I don't care to hear." Wulfgar turned and started away.
Jaw hanging open, Morik watched him go. By the time he turned back, Deudermont had likewise retreated into the city. Robillard, though, held his ground and his sour expression.
"Might I?" Morik started to ask, walking toward the wizard.
"Be gone and be fast about it, rogue," Robillard warned. "Else you will become a stain on the ground, awaiting the next rain to wash you away."
Clever Morik, the ultimate survivor, who hated wizards, didn't have to be told twice.
Part 3
A WILD LAND MADE WILDER
The course of events in my life have often made me examine the nature of good and evil. I have witnessed the purest forms of both repeatedly, particularly evil. The totality of my early life was spent living among it, a wickedness so thick in the air that it choked me and forced me away.
Only recently, as my reputation has begun to gain me some acceptance among the human populations-a tolerance, at least, if not a welcome-have I come to witness a more complex version of what I observed in Menzoberranzan, a shade of gray varying in lightness and darkness. So many humans, it seems, a vast majority, have within their makeup a dark side, a hunger for the macabre, and the ability to dispassionately dismiss the agony of another in the pursuit of the self.
Nowhere is this more evident than in the Prisoner's Carnival at Luskan and other such pretenses of justice. Prisoners, sometimes guilty, sometimes not-it hardly matters-are paraded before the blood-hungry mob, then beaten, tortured, and finally executed in grand fashion. The presiding magistrate works very hard to exact the most exquisite screams of the purest agony; his job is to twist the expressions of those prisoners into the epitome of terror, the ultimate horror reflected in their eyes.
Once, when in Luskan with Captain Deudermont of the Sea Sprite, I ventured to the carnival to witness the "trials" of several pirates we had fished from the sea after sinking their ship. Witnessing the spectacle of a thousand people crammed around a grand stage, yelling and squealing with delight as these miserable pirates were literally cut into pieces, almost made me walk away from Deudermont's ship, almost made me forego a life as a pirate hunter and retreat to the solitude of the forest or the mountains.
Of course, Catti-brie was there to remind me of the truth of it, to point out that these same pirates often exacted equal tortures upon innocent prisoners. While she admitted that such a truth did not justify the Prisoner's Carnival-Catti-brie was so horrified by the mere thought of the place that she would not go anywhere near it-she argued that such treatment of pirates was preferable to allowing them free run of the high seas.
But why? Why any of it?
The question has bothered me for all these years, and in seeking its answer I have come to explore yet another facet of these incredibly complex creatures called humans. Why would common, otherwise decent folk, descend to such a level as the spectacle of Prisoner's Carnival? Why would some of the Sea Sprite's own crew, men and women I knew to be honorable and decent, take pleasure in viewing such a macabre display of torture?
The answer, perhaps (if there is a more complicated answer than the nature of evil itself), lies in an examination of the attitudes of other races. Among the goodly races, humans alone "celebrate" the executions and torments of prisoners. Halfling societies would have no part of such a display-halfling prisoners have been known to die of overeating. Nor would dwarves, as aggressive as they can be. In dwarven society, prisoners are dealt with efficiently and tidily, without spectacle and out of public view. A murderer among dwarves would be dealt a single blow to the neck. Never did I see any elves at Prisoner's Carnival, except on one occasion when a pair ventured by, then quickly left, obviously disgusted. My understanding is that in gnome society there are no executions, just a lifetime of imprisonment in an elaborate cell.
So why humans? What is it about the emotional construct of the human being that brings about such a spectacle as Prisoner's Carnival? Evil? I think that too simple an answer.
Dark elves relish torture-how well I know!-and their actions are, indeed, based on sadism and evil, and an insatiable desire to satisfy the demonic hunger of the spider queen, but with humans, as with everything about humans, the answer becomes a bit more complex. Surely there is a measure of sadism involved, particularly on the part of the presiding magistrate and his torturer assistants, but for the common folk, the powerless paupers cheering in the audience, I believe their joy stems from three sources.
First, peasants in Faerun are a powerless lot, subjected to the whims of unscrupulous lords and landowners, and with the ever-present threat of some invasion or another by goblins, giants, or fellow humans, stomping flat the lives they have carved. Prisoner's Carnival affords these unfortunate folk a taste of power, the power over life and death. At long last they feel some sense of control over their own lives.
Second, humans are not long-lived like elves and dwarves; even halflings will usually outlast them. Peasants face the possibility of death daily. A mother fortunate enough to survive two or three birthings will likely witness the death of at least one of her children. Living so intimately with death obviously breeds a curiosity and fear, even terror. At Prisoner's Carnival these folk witness death at its most horrible, the worst that death can give, and take solace in the fact that their own deaths, unless they become the accused brought before the magistrates, will not likely be nearly as terrible. I have witnessed your worst, grim Death, and I fear you not.
The third explanation for the appeal of Prisoner's Carnival lies in the necessity of justice and punishment in order to maintain order in a society. This was the side of the debate held up by Robillard the wizard upon my return to the Sea Sprite after witnessing the horror. While he took no pleasure in viewing the carnival and rarely attended, Robillard defended it as vigorously as I might expect from the magistrate himself. The public humiliation of these men, the public display of their agony, would keep other folk on an honest course, he believed. Thus, the cheers of the peasant mob were no more than a rousing affirmation of their belief in the law and order of their society.
It is a difficult argument to defeat, particularly concerning the effectiveness of such displays in dissuading future criminals, but is it truly justice?
Armed with Robillard's arguments, I went to some minor magistrates in Luskan on the pretense of deciding better protocol for the Sea Sprite to hand over captured pirates, but in truth to get them talking about Prisoner's Carnival. It became obvious to and very quickly, that the carnival itself had little to do with justice. Many innocent men and women had found their way to the stage in Luskan, forced into false confession by sheer brutality, then punished publicly for those crimes. The magistrates knew this and readily admitted it by citing their relief that at least the prisoners we brought to them were assuredly guilty!
For that reason alone I can never come to terms with the Prisoner's Carnival. One measure of any society is the way it deals with those who have walked away from the course of community and decency, and an indecent treatment of these criminals decreases the standards of morality to the level of the tortured.
Yet the practice continues to thrive in many cities in Faerun and in many, many rural communities, where justice, as a matter of survival, must be even more harsh and definitive.
Perhaps there is a fourth explanation for the carnival. Perhaps the crowds gather around eagerly merely for the excitement of the show. Perhaps there is no underlying cause or explanation other than the fun of it. I do not like to consider this a possibility, for if humans on as large a scale are capable of eliminating empathy and sympathy so completely as to actually enjoy the spectacle of watching another suffer horribly, then that, I fear, is the truest definition of evil.
After all of the hours of investigation, debate, and interrogation, and many, many hours of contemplation on the nature of these humans among whom I live, I am left without simple answers to travesties such as the Prisoner's Carnival.
I am hardly surprised. Rarely do I find a simple answer to anything concerning humans. That, perhaps, is the reason I find little tedium in my day-to-day travels and encounters. That, perhaps, is the reason I have come to love them.