My Short Stories

The Guilty

"Bring him out. The white one with the accent." The words echoed in the darkness for a couple of seconds, and then the silence was broken by the footfalls of large boots against wet concrete. Heathen found himself backing away the closer the man came, until his bare back was pressed up tightly against a set of cold, steel bars. His arms quickly wrapped themselves around his knees, which he had bent close to himself in order to properly fit inside the small cage. His brown eyes remained wide open as he listened to the man struggling to find the right key, each -click- as one metal hit against the other being a countdown, until finally, he felt the correct key begin to rattle at his cage's door.

He wished that some miracle would happen at that moment. For the key to break, so that he'd be trapped inside the cage forever. Or that maybe someone would attack or cause a distraction. Or perhaps that they realized they made an error in judgement, and that they'd simply let him go. But such thoughts, Heathen knew, were trivial to his current situation. To dwell and hope for them to happen would simply lead him toward madness.

But god, how he wanted such a miracle to finally occur.

As the door swung open, the cage was flooded in a blinding white light that almost cause Heathen to scream out in pain as he quickly closed his eyes and brought both his hands up to protect his vision. He'd not seen even a single ray of light for days now, and even though the Quarters was a location that he was familiar with, the sudden blindness caused Heathen to become disoriented.

"Judgement time," spoke the familiar voice in an almost soothing tone as powerful hands grasped at his hair, which he used to pull Heathen out of the cage, nearly tearing away the clump he had taken from the man's scalp.

As Heathen was kicked along, his eyes finally adjusted to the lighting, though tears still flowed from them. The sight was about what he had prepared himself for. Dozens of pairs of eyes watched him. Some sat in silence, doing their own judging, no doubt wishing that they were the ones who sat on the throne so that they could pass their own judgement unto him. The others, the more vocal of the bunch, jeered at Heathen. There was no doubt in his mind that the vast majority of the crowd would have wanted to jump in and tear him apart themselves, but all were held back by the mere sight of the brute that was currently escorting him throughout the Quarters.

He looked left and barely had time to react to the small room that used to be his quarters, now sacked clean and left in a barren state. Everything that was his was probably incinerated or thrown out with the rest of the trash, if not then held a trophy by one or the other from the lesser wards. The sad frown on his face quickly vanished as a square kick to his mid-back sent him reeling forwards, almost causing him to fall on his face, before he managed to awkwardly catch himself with his feet. Heathen looked back with a shocked look on his face only to see the smug-looking warden with a grin on his face.

This saddened him as well, to see a friend revel in his misery almost overnight.

It was Baxter who sat on the throne that night. Baxter, as far as Heathen could remember, was one of the two Commanders of the former Headmaster, Reaver. Heathen never had much interaction with Baxter, but was thoroughly surprised to see him sitting in the throne rather than the other one, Orfeo. Despite his brutish nature, Orfeo had always been the one who commanded more respect among the ranks than Baxter. Some would have even gone as far as to say that Baxter worked for Orfeo rather than Reaver. Heathen, of course, never bothered in saying, much less thinking, such things. Tonight, though, he doubted that his opinion would matter much. He could tell just from looking into their eyes that his judgment was already set in stone. The trial itself seemed to him more of a show of force as well as a keeping of traditions.

The thought in itself didn't help. Heathen couldn't help but feel terrified as he looked up towards the throne. Baxter, looking down on him with a stern look on his withered face, sat at the mere edge of the seat, one hand clasping the other, with an unmoving glare directed straight at Heathen. Orfeo himself stood to the right of Baxter, his hands clasped behind his back, staring into the crowds that stood and sat behind Heathen before every so often turning his gaze toward Heathen himself. Heathen didn't even have to look up at him to know when Orfeo's gaze was trained on him. The Commander always did trail a cold chill up his spine. Even in the days before the ordeal began, when he knew he was in good terms with the Commander, he still felt a chill whenever their gaze met. An uneasy look would appear on Heathen. He'd radiate nervousness, would find himself unable to utter even a single comprehensible word at times. The fear that Orfeo was capable of striking was obvious to Heathen, and not once did her ever want to be on the man's bad side.