"Nori Akagi, captain of the Marziale Motley Crew, you are charged with high treason, robbery, and cold-blooded murder. Do you have anything to say for yourself?"
The courtroom felt so very large. Its walls were of white marble, the ceiling was high and domed, giving Nori the impression that she was inside a seashell. Her wrists, cuffed with copper bands stained with blood, were chained to the back of a post, as were her ankles. The pole was pressed uncomfortably against her backside. She shook her hair out of her face and glared up at the person elevated above her, ironically like a god or a king sitting in a high throne.
"Bastard!" she snarled. "You're disgusting!"
The Ivory Prince's court was seated below him in a row. All four of them stared down at her skeptically. What did it matter that she please them? They were all in his pocket.
"I know what you are! You're the most repulsive thing I've ever seen!" She looked at the third member of the court, the one with abnormally blonde hair and piercing blue eyes, addressing him this time. "And you could have stopped it! Don't tell me I'm wrong!" To Nori's unpleasant surprise, her throat was clenching up and her eyes burned. "You monster, look me in the eyes!"
"That will do," the one in the throne said. "Do you have anything to say in your defense, Miss Akagi?"
Nori screeched with fury and pain. Nobody flinched or made any sign that they acknowledged her scream, except the blonde court member, who looked away.
"You know what the sentence for treason is, don't you, Miss Akagi?" the Ivory Prince asked her, curling his lip sickeningly.
"Stay away from me!" Yes, Nori knew all too well. Panic was swelling steadily from her stomach to her head, making her dizzy with fear.
The Ivory Prince withdrew a long sword from who knows where. "Death. As you know, traitors to the crown-" he leaped down from his perch like a wolf- "must die. Release her," he ordered the guards standing on either side of her post. They nodded and unlocked her chains. Nori fell to the ground with exhaustion on all fours.
"You... you must be proud of your little toy. I never suspected him," Nori said. "But I expect he's already left the city, hasn't he? Hasn't come to watch my trial," she spat.
"Bow to me, and perhaps it will be a quick death."
Cold dread was suffocating Nori. Almost in a trance, she slowly got to her knees and bowed her head low to her executioner. What else was there to do? There was no hope now. Her crew was trapped. Satoru might be dead already. Michi was in jail. Even Kei had apparently abandoned her. Now there was just her, and the Ivory Prince.
She heard him walk forward, and there was the slightest swish of metal as he lifted the sword high into the air.
There was a sound of ripping flesh and a scream.
*x's song: Arsonist's Lullaby by Pitch Hawk*
YOU ARE READING
Motley (#Wattys2016)
Adventure"You're a captain? Of what?" Nori glanced sideways at Michi. "It's a secret. You can't tell anyone." "Cross my heart and hope to die!" "Yeah... We're all pirates." Nori Akagi thought she had it made with the rest of the Marziale Motley pirate crew...
