Yazata paused for a moment, waiting for something. That something was the arrival of three further individuals, through a heretofore concealed side door — two of which the four men recognized. The first was none other than the madwoman who had assaulted and captured them. The second was their victim, astride automaton legs that were a bit too long for her, her body concealed by a coat hung loosely about her shoulders. The madwoman, Blackhand, carried in her hands a box of dark, lacquered wood, bearing a symbol of Zavesh the Three-hearted upon its lid in brass inlay. This one, rather than pulling his chest open, showed Zavesh holding a golden heart in one hand and a short dagger in the other. Among the four dead men, none could get a good look at her face — somehow, Blackhand’s glasses seemed to always reflect the light exactly into the observer’s eyes after just a brief glance. The third individual wasn’t a person. It was an unsettling figure, the shape of a young maiden rendered in silver metal, draped with maroon cloth. The face under that red hood was perfect, but motionless. The Red Hood, as ever, followed in silence and moved with unsettling grace.
The inquisitor, then, proceeded, while the two women approached. Was the organ growing louder? Aldritch and Hegio both asked themselves this question. One thing was undeniable; the music was definitely becoming faster, rising towards a crescendo as the Inquisitor continued reading.
“In addition to these charges, Aldritch Herebor is hereby condemned to blinding by the hand of Juno Oldfield prior to execution, so that your eyes may replace the light which you took from her, as is her right. In the same manner, Hegio Calvus is hereby condemned to the severing of the left hand above the wrist.”
“You lie! You speak of mercy, yet condemn me to this needless cruelty?! I know well enough that flesh forcefully taken can never-” Aldritch began to scream, only to fall silent at the sight of Juno, or rather, at the sight of his arm, attached to Juno.
Somewhat surprisingly, Aldritch didn’t resume his screaming. In fact, he did nothing, it seemed that this sight had pushed him over the edge, and he simply fell silent, staring in bewildered disbelief.
The screaming didn’t return even when the two women stopped in front of him and Blackhand opened the box, revealing its contents to be things that Aldritch was familiar with, at least enough to know what they were: Two graft-stock wet-storage capsules, a small syringe with a dull tip, and an ocular extractor, a type designed to seamlessly sever the eye from the ocular nerve. It was a metal apparatus with a bulb of countless petals, a handful of which were bladed so as to sever the optic nerve as close to the eyeball as possible.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
As the pipe organ reached its crescendo, Juno took the syringe, and walked towards Aldritch. The man just stared, trailing the hand that had once been his as it approached. He couldn’t move from where he knelt — in fact, he couldn’t even consider moving, so tight a grip the witch-inquisitor’s curse had on him. Perhaps because he had come to expect the pain of being punished by a curse, he didn’t notice the lurid blackness beneath his skin writhing and flaring magenta at the inquisitor’s wordless command.
Juno grasped Aldritch’s chin in her right hand, tilting his head back as one might do in order to re-pose a life-sized doll. She administered three drops of the syringe’s contents, a yellowish solution, into each of his eyes. Almost instantly, they took on a glassy appearance, stiffening in their sockets, even bulging out a bit. The ocular extractor followed, and slowly, the girl brought it down on him, craning her neck such that, were she not visored, one could be certain she was squinting in effort.
What could be done within thirty seconds instead took an excruciating, exacting several minutes due to the limitations of Juno’s visor. Throughout the whole process, Aldritch didn’t so much as make a sound or twitch. The extractor’s blades were so sharp that one could only notice they were cutting when the light went out of his eyes.
And, just like the glass eyes of a doll, so too did Aldritch’s eyes come out nearly exactly spherical, floating down into their waiting capsule with the thinnest trails of crimson. With that, Blackhand closed the box and handed it off to the Red Hood. Aldritch was left kneeling in that exact pose, rivulets of blood and tears trailing down the sides of his face and mouth agape in a wordless scream.
Blackhand, then, approached Hegio Calvus. He, who, among the four, bore no black halo, had the dubious mercy of retaining enough control over his body to crane his head and stare up at the monstrous woman, not with hate or defiance, but simple resignation. The severing of his hand took place in an instant; a blade of flexible glass, whipped through the joint. Blackhand took the moment after to seal his wound, smearing a black poultice over the stump. Even this wasn't enough to elicit a reaction.
“I shall now conduct the ritual execution,” Yazata said. She drew her bar-mace, the Black Trapezohedron, and struck it against her leg. Its unsettling resonance joined with the organ, and, from the sleeve of her left hand, two further Black Bindings emerged. One circled the statue of Igaria, joining with the unseen organ-player, and the other wrapped around the left wrist of Blackhand. A pulse of magenta light ran down the lengths of her bindings, bidding all those joined with them to move into position — those bound by their hands as a simple impulse, those bound by their foreheads as an irresistible command. The seven involved in the ritual moved to form a heptagram centered on the statues of Zavesh and Igaria, and therefore the organ-player. Yazata stood to the right of this twin monument, while Blackhand stood to the left, with the four dead men filling the remaining positions.
Juno, guarded closely by the Red Hood, retreated slightly further so as to stand clear of the ritual circle, also to the left of the statues. It was at this point that Juno noticed the organ-player was none other than Firminus.
If you’d like to read ahead, consider heading on over to the ! You get up to 20 advance chapters for both Retribution Engine and Cherno Caster.
I’d also greatly appreciate it if you could rate my story, maybe even leave a review or advanced review! Advanced reviews count for more in the eyes of the algorithm, so that pretty much means they determine the success of my work.
For a link to the discord, check the synopsis.
