Breaking the Sword

Bare Dreams (II)

The local Guard hauled her out of the jail bright and early the next morning, after a night spent tossing and turning on her wooden plank. She should have been dead tired, but somehow Elyse couldn't sit still in the paddy wagon that brought her and her four guards to the courthouse. She received no less than five reprimands and two cuffs on the ears for fidgeting on the ride over.

At least she didn't have far to travel to learn if she would live or die. Mothersport was evidently something of a governmental seat for the southeastern region of Adal, and had been since before the Occupation.

In fact, if Elyse was any judge of architecture whatsoever, she'd guess that the courthouse, an imposing building of quarried stone with an impressive dome, had stood for at least two hundred years. She figured Tristram would probably have been able to tell her a whole pack of stories about it.

The guards held her in a small holding cell in the basement for at least another hour before finally she was brought to a small courtroom on the second floor. Elyse hadn't seen the inside of many courtrooms in her time, but this one seemed to be laid out much like any other the Empire over.

The Magistrate sat behind a desk on a raised platform, facing two desks where the advocates usually sat. At the moment, only a young woman in a headscarf and long-sleeved dress waited quietly at the table to the Magistrate's left. The white-haired Magistrate didn't look up from his papers when the prisoner arrived, but the girl closely watched the whole process of Elyse being escorted in, hand cuffs switched from behind to before her, sat in the empty chair, and chained to the ring in the center of the table by her wrist manacles.

Their prisoner secured, the guards stepped back to posts against the walls. Elyse glanced at the ceiling and saw that the gallery Merrick had referenced was a balcony that wrapped around the four walls of the room on the second story, with risers of seats for spectators. Amid the law clerks taking a break from research and interested members of the public, the thief caught sight of Merrick's mop of blond curls. The northman inclined his head slightly as she caught his eye, then looked away as if his attention merely wandered as he waited for the trial to begin.

Elyse turned to the girl beside her. She was a pretty grey-eyed thing with a dusting of freckles across her nose. That, and her small stature, made her seem very young.

"I'm sorry, how old are you?" the thief asked bluntly, remembering at least to keep her voice to a murmur.

"Old enough to have spent two days and two sleepless nights preparing your defense," her advocate answered, equally frank. "So I'll ask you for a little respect, thank you."

Elyse smiled. Steel was something you wanted in you advocate, after all. "Papa tried to instill a little respect into me, but I'm afraid his lessons always lacked a certain... force. I take it you're my advocate?"

"Good morning to you too, Elyse. I'm Andraste Junia, and yes, I am representing you."

Elyse looked the girl up and down once more. There was no way that full-blood Larentine name fit this fair-skinned, fair-eyed chit . "Keep me out of the noose, honey, and I'll call you anything you like."

Her advocate settled her papers on the table and turned fully toward her. "Have you been treated well, considering?"

Elyse shrugged. "About as well as could be expected."

"Good. We're just waiting on the Emperor's Voice. He's twenty minutes late."

"The clock strikes when the emperor commands," Elyse observed sardonically.

"Indeed," her advocate agreed. "We managed to get you one of the few Adalian magistrates left in Mothersport. Hopefully he'll be more inclined to give Adalians an opportunity to recover their losses than to indulge Larentine calls for blood."

Elyse glanced up at the wizened little man behind the big desk. He still had his face buried in the papers and books in front of him, but something about his aspect didn't inspire her with confidence. How much did one have to compromise to stay on the bench after the Empire took over the government?

She didn't much want to pursue that line of thinking, so she asked, "How do you know Me– Marcus?"

Her advocate shuffled with her papers again as she answered, "It's there in the name. Marcus Junius, Andraste Junia. In Larentia, that means we share a father named Junius."

"He's your brother," Elyse said, doubtfully.

"That's right."

"I can see the resemblance."

Andraste, if that was her real name, turned a reluctant smile on her. "I advise against using sarcasm on the Magistrate."

"Duly noted," the thief returned. "Am I likely to get a chance to address him at all?"

"If he holds to the old Adalian way, you will. Back then judges tried to be part of the communities they served. They tried to consider all voices.... Larentine practice is that only advocates speak."

"Yeah, the Empire's big on controlling who gets a say. I–"

At that moment the door at the back of the courtroom opened and a large shaved-headed man in prosecutor's robes strode in, trailed by a stooped clerk who carried a small mountain of books and papers. Everyone looked up at the Voice's entrance, and the man bore the notice as his due.

"Good morning, Priscus," the magistrate said, looking up for the first time as the Voice directed his clerk where to lay the books and papers.

"Good morning, your honor," the Voice answered, swaggering around like he owned the place.

Well, Elyse checked herself, he was clearly full Larentine, so in a way he did own the courthouse, the city, and the entire countryside. Her fingers itched to lift that heavy purse at his waist. What kind of lawyer carried gold into court anyway? He was practically screaming that the magistrate was in his pocket.

Probably the point.