Wandering Warrior: Judge - Chapter 36

Chapter 36

Gleason slapped the bear shifter again, dropping the burly mayor to his knees.  “I’m tired of your excuses, lycan.  I’m tired of these little, worthless villages, and their worthless little people.  I’m tired of chasing this worthless man around this stupid forest, and I’m quickly running out of the capability to care about collateral damage.  Now, tell me everything you know, or you will find out what happens when I reach the end of my patience.”  The morning sunlight was like daggers in his eyes, and it made him more irritable than normal.  Even seeing a full platoon of thirty White Wardens in their immaculate uniforms did little to make him feel better.  He motioned for his man holding the mayor’s daughter to provide a demonstration, and he punched the girl in the kidneys hard enough to make her gasp in pain.

“Enough!”  The mayor’s wife struggled against the shackles she was held in, trying to break free from another of Gleason’s men.  “He’s told you everything he knows!”

“Silence!”  The man holding the mayor’s wife’s chains jerked them hard enough that she fell awkwardly onto her back, the shackles causing her to cry out in pain as they dug into her flesh.  “You will only speak when spoken to.”

Murmurs from the crowd surrounding the spectacle were quickly turning hostile, but Gleason had no concerns.  His pristine white uniform told them everything they needed to know.  You might be able to argue with a Blue Warden, or even fight with a member of the Black.  But no one ever stepped out of line around the branch that specialized in investigations and executions.

“Why don’t we start from the beginning.”  Gleason didn’t phrase it as a question.  He snapped his fingers, and one of his men ran over with a camp chair so he could have a seat.  “Tell me what happened, from the moment this stranger walked into town, to the moment he left.”

As the lycan spewed forth more lies, Gleason thought back to how close he must have been to meeting his target on the trail the first day he had set forth from Greendown.  If it hadn’t been for those foolish bandits creating a second path through the forest, he could have ended his mission before going through all this trouble.  Considering how easily the bandits had been defeated by Holden and his few followers, all the testimonies of their former ‘captives’ were hardly believable.  A bare handful of people–even if he believed that one of them was Captain Cross–wouldn’t have been able to take down an organized group of any proper size.

It was far more likely this village had been working in concert with a small band of miscreants, and the undead were a fabrication used to scare those not in on their plans.  Gleason didn’t think the entire village was bad, after all.  But when they let a dirty shifter lead them, they were barely better than the dregs of society.  That was why he was back here, in this flyspeck on the map, trying to learn more about his target.

His men had already tracked his target back along the trail to a village stricken by some kind of plague, and lost them shortly after.  Even Gleason’s Long Eye spell couldn’t follow them through the dense forest.  It was too much ground to cover, and he had no place from which to start his search even if he had the mana to spare.  Since there was no way they would have risked the sickness in the last place they were spotted, that left this village as his best chance of finding out where James Holden was going next.

“...and then, they left.  None of them spoke of going anywhere else, besides heading to Greendown, like I said before.”  The mayor wiped at the trickle of blood running down the corner of his mouth.  “That’s all I can tell you.”

“And you expect me to believe that.  Do you think I'm a fool, mayor?  If what you said was true, they would have reached the city days ago.  I’ve certainly received no word of them, and I would be the first to know.”  Gleason stood, pulling out his boot knife.  “I think, perhaps, you’ve misunderstood the situation you’re in.  Maybe you just aren’t hearing me.”  He reached out, viper-quick, pulling the mayor’s ear out from his head before slashing it off in one stroke.  “Perhaps this will help you listen.”  Gleason moved to cover up the motion with his body so the crowd couldn’t see it at first, waiting to see how effective it would be before revealing his actions.

The bear shifter only gave a short grunt of pain, barely reacting to losing a portion of his flesh.  It disappointed Gleason to see the lycan was so resilient, but he couldn’t help but feel the flash of excitement at what it meant.  To find the man’s limits, he would have to try something else.  He stepped back and tossed the ear aside as he unlimbered the whip coiled on his belt.

“No!”  The daughter, upon seeing what Gleason had done, managed to pull free of the White Warden holding her.  While the mayor and his wife were in shackles meant to control shifters, they didn’t have enough sets to be able to have any to use on the girl.  They were expensive after all, and Gleason wasn’t in the habit of taking shifters prisoner.  The girl immediately started to change, heavy claws growing from her fingertips as her face elongated into a snout and thick fur sprouted from her body.  Surprisingly, she still managed to speak during her transformation.  “Leave him alone, you monster!”

The shifter girl, now a three hundred pound grizzly bear, slapped another of Gleason’s men away as he tried to rush toward her.  Blood flew as the shifter’s claws slashed his man’s chest, staining his white clothing red.  Smiling, Gleason flicked his wrist in an almost lazy fashion, cracking his whip across the mayor’s chest and upper arms, flaying his skin to the bone.  This time, the stoic man couldn’t hold back the scream that erupted from his throat.  The magic embedded in the leather, silver, and steel braids made any wounds burn like they had been doused in salt and acid, compounding the agony the man was feeling.

“Come, little bear.”  Gleason’s ice-chip eyes seemed to burn with excitement, and sparks danced from his free hand.  “Let me show you what happens when you defy a White Warden.”

She charged him, rumbling forward on all fours.  The onlookers gaped at the spectacle, taken aback by the sudden turn of events.  They knew–they all knew–the moment the girl had struck a Warden, that her life was forfeit.  Gleason’s favorite part of his job was being an executioner.  Even though he hated being outside the city, it did have its perks.  Like getting to decide how to execute criminals.  Inside the city, he had to bow to his uncle’s orders.  Here, he was the highest authority.  Gleason could make much better examples of criminals, so things like this in the future didn’t need to happen.  He was more than happy to sacrifice the shifter girl so that others would make better choices in their lives.  It would give some meaning to her worthless life, and that made it an even better reason for him to enforce the law.

He let her get close enough to think she had a chance, then leapt over her, scoring her back with his whip.  Gleason was impressed that the girl didn’t immediately collapse, and instead spun around, ready to charge him once again.  To encourage her, he cracked his whip at her father, neatly splitting the knuckles of the hand clenching his chest.

The bear reared up on two legs, letting loose a chest-shaking roar before charging at Gleason once again.  This time, he used his free hand to cast a spell that caused a fist of air to punch the shifter hard enough to stop her dead in her tracks.  He slashed his arm back and forth, leaving two thick lines of bleeding flesh across the bear’s chest and stomach.  This time, it was too much for the young lycan to take, and she dropped to the ground, trying to back away.  Gleason whipped her again, this time catching her across the snout.  The bear whimpered in pain, and tried to turn and run.  His whip caught her around the trailing foot, nearly severing it as he jerked backward hard enough to pull the heavy shifter off her feet.  She whimpered once, before falling unconscious, the pain too much for her to take.  Her naked form slowly started changing back into that of a human, and Gleason rolled his wrist, ready to whip her again.

“Stop!  Please!”  The shifter woman, still on her back, tried to get to her feet.  The White Warden standing over her put his boot on her abdomen, holding her in place.  “Have mercy, she’s just a child!”

“I’ll-I’ll tell you anything!  Just leave my daughter alone!”  The mayor had sprouted hair along his cheeks and arms, but the magic in the shackles kept him from doing more.  That he could even push through enough of the magic to do what he had was impressive, and showed how powerful of a shifter the mayor was.  “I know things!  Important things!”

Gleason let loose a sigh.  He had been hoping the mayor would have been able to provide at least a little more of a break from his boredom.  His whip, as if it had a mind of its own, uncurled from the girl’s ankle and rolled back up.  He made sure not to dismiss the spell that inflicted pain on the wounds, though.  There would be no escape from the agony for these unclean things.  If left unattended, it would fade naturally after a few weeks time.  Some were driven insane by it, but those that made it through came out changed for the better.  Just another perk of Gleason’s position, helping to improve the little people beyond what they could ever achieve on their own.  His eyes swept over the mob of witnesses, who all flinched back after his display of power.  It was good they knew their place, now that he had reminded them of it.

“You are not in a position to bargain with me, mayor.”  Gleason flicked off a bit of fur-encrusted flesh from the end of his whip as he approached.  “You are going to tell me everything you know.  And I do mean, everything.  At the end of our conversation, I’m going to finish punishing your daughter for assaulting a White Warden.”  His wife wailed in distress, but was cut off by a thump from his man.  “The severity of her punishment will be measured against the quality and quantity of the information you have provided me.  Now, I would encourage you to hold nothing back, as her survival surely depends upon it.”

This time, as the mayor started talking, Gleason paid close attention.  Their discussion went on well past lunch, and finally, as early afternoon started to pass, the mayor ran out of things to talk about.  His rasping and dry voice trailed off, and he looked up at the leader of the White Wardens with nothing but fear in his eyes.

“Good.  You have done well, mayor.  I think you might have even told me enough to save your daughter’s life.”  Gleason motioned to his men, who had fashioned a pair of posts while he had been interrogating the mayor.  “She still needs to be held up as an example to anyone who learns of this, but she can do so by telling the story herself.”

As his men strung her up, he ignored the pleading of the mayor and his wife.  Gleason had already explained to them what was going to happen, and felt no remorse for their unlawful ways.  Knowingly consorting with people that were actively planning to weaken the guilds was always going to end up with them paying the price in blood, and he was here to collect.

The girl’s shifter nature had allowed her to heal some of the damage over the last few hours, which only allowed him to push the limit even farther.  Gleason’s control of his whip was precise enough that he never cut too deep, only flaying open the girl’s skin in careful layers over her back and abdomen.  He made sure to take one eye, and scar her face evenly on both sides.  At some point, one of his men cut out the mother’s tongue.  She had probably said something to deserve it.  The mayor had dropped to his knees, tears running clean streaks through his dirty cheeks.  He was a defeated man, without a spark of defiance left.  No one else in the village would meet Gleason’s eye, all of them only looking at their feet.

“There.  Now, the letter of the law has been followed and enforced.  Beyond punishing the mayor himself, of course.  Since his wife and daughter are crippled, I choose to leave him whole, so they won’t starve to death out here on the frontier.  I can certainly show mercy.”  Gleason looked around at his men for approval, and they all murmured their agreement.  He then pointed at the heavy emblem hanging from the mayor’s neck.  “Oh, and he isn’t the mayor anymore.  No lawbreaking lycan should be in charge of a frontier village in need of strong, proper leadership.  Choose someone from yourselves to take his place, or I will do it for you.”

A haughty older teen, just shy of his twenties, broke from the group and took the pendant from the man, shoving the old mayor in the dirt before putting it on his own neck.  “I’ll take it, Mister Warden.”

“Fine.  I’m sure you will be an upstanding example.”  The new mayor turned to leave, but Gleason cleared his throat to stop him.  “Give them a day to gather their things, and then run them out of town.  If anyone stands against you… burn their house to ashes.”  The young mayor seemed happy to get Gleason’s orders, as any small town leader should.  The crowd quickly dispersed, leaving the platoon of Wardens to their own devices.  A few villagers collected up the bleeding wife and daughter, while the former mayor followed them numbly.  “Let’s go.  Perhaps taking a look at the farmhouses around Greendown will reveal the location of our wayward targets.”

As Gleason and his men prepared their horses, he thought over the past few days.  He had learned much from this excursion.  There was a growing rot all throughout the city, and it was his job to dig it out, one he was looking forward to doing.

After, of course, he killed James Holden.