Epilogue
Parting Ways
Outside Gottestag, Gotland
Sir Burkhardt's heavy hand rested on Lys' shoulder to keep her from doing anything stupid. Prince Wilfried had promised to spare Maus' life at Lys' pleading, but he would not be spared punishment. Although the King had stated his wish to try Maus' case himself, the Prince was not going to bring Maus all the way back to Lothria. Too many of his bloody-minded companions wanted Maus dead, so he chose to execute justice now. After the Witch Queen's death, her hold on the Orks, Kobolds and other creatures was broken and now they warred with their former human allies. The city was in chaos, and no doubt similar scenes were being played out across the lands of the Witch Queen's domain. Already many who were sworn to the Witch Queen were now swearing themselves to Prince Wilfried. He needed to take charge of the situation and so he had all the more reason to deal with this matter quickly.
Maus had already been flogged with forty lashes less one, but it was only the prelude to the main performance. There was a punishment in Gotland known as the Five Marks of Living Shame. Some argued that it was worse than death as you were made to live in infamy as an object of hatred and scorn. Nothing less would satisfy Prince Wilfried's companions and likely the Prince himself.
Although each of Maus' limbs were bound by thick straps of leather, there was little need of it as he offered no resistance to his punishment. He was like an empty shell, the better part of him having died with Loreley, who now rested in an unmarked grave along with the rest of the witches who were killed in the fighting.
Prince Wilfried stood in front of Maus to pronounce judgment while Sir Eckhardt stood ready to execute it.
"Maus of Kohnen, you stand charged of high treason to the Crown, murder, insurrection, and other crimes. These crimes are more than enough to warrant death, but death would be a mercy for one such as you. Instead I sentence you to the Living Shame and so you shall bear the Five Marks as testament against you. First, for the hand you raised against your King..."
The man holding the strap for Maus' right arm pulled it taut over the chopping block, and with a cleaver heated red-hot, Sir Eckhardt lopped off Maus' hand with all the ceremony of a butcher preparing a ham hock at a meat stall in the market. Maus, who had kept silent through the flogging, was unable to keep from crying out. Sir Burkhardt tightened his grip on Lys' shoulder.
"Bear it," he whispered. "His Highness can do no less to spare his life."
Lys knew it, but she could scarcely stand to watch the consequences of her actions play out before her. Was it not enough that Loreley was dead? She was his only reason for doing what he did. Lys knew that was not enough for the people he betrayed and all the lives trampled underfoot during his years of service to the Witch Queen. How many hundreds, how many thousands would be baying for his blood if they knew?
Prince Wilfried continued, "For the feet that rushed to violence..."
Sir Eckhardt went behind Maus and stooped down to cut the tendon in the heel of his left foot.
"For the lips that betrayed your oath..."
It would have been truly ghastly if Maus' lips were to be cut off entirely, so it almost seemed gentle that they were merely split by a long cut that ran from the corner of his nose down to his chin.
"For the ears that gave heed to the whispers of the enemy...."
Next was Maus' left ear, cleanly sheared off and cast aside.
"And for the eyes that were tempted by the sight of ill-gotten gains..."
In a move that he must have practiced before, rather than stabbing into the eye socket, Sir Eckhardt put out Maus' right eye with a mere flick of the edge of his blade. By this point, Maus had been reduced to nothing more than some poorly stifled moaning from all that had been done to him.
"I hereby declare you an outlaw and banish you from this kingdom," Prince Wilfried said finally. "By these Five Marks shall you be known and should any man's hand be raised against you in these borders, no guilt shall be imputed to him. No doubt your ill fame will spread throughout the Eight Kingdoms and you will find yourself an outlaw there as well. You are cursed to wander the earth until Death takes you at last to your final judgment. Repent, and may God have mercy on your soul, for no man who knows your sins ever shall. Now release him."
Maus was unbound, but he did not move from his place. A man-at-arms with a spear moved as if to drive him off, but the Prince motioned from him to leave Maus be.
Corothas, who had be standing at Lys' side observing all this, said, "So this is how your people mete out justice."
Lys looked at the pitiful, broken and bleeding figure of the man who had saved her life, the very man she had dedicated her life to saving, and felt the terrible emptiness of what little she had to show for all her efforts.
"Yeah, I guess so," she said bitterly, realizing only then that she was crying.
Someone hugged her from behind. Surely it was not Sir Burkhardt, and the softness of the body clinging to hers confirmed it.
"I'm sorry, Lys," Gudrun said.
"You knew..." Lys replied. "You knew it all from the beginning, didn't you? Why didn't you stop me if this was what was going to happen?"
"Would anything I said have stopped you?" Gudrun asked. "I see so many things... Most of them never come to pass, but the closer I get, the more firmly the path is set. Possibility becomes inevitability. By the time we reached Gottestag, the end was clear. If you truly wanted to free Loreley from the Witch Queen, it was the only way. You could not save her life, but perhaps you saved her soul."
"What do you mean?"
"Do you really think an arrow from a Horseman is all it would take to kill someone so powerful? Whatever was left of Loreley saw a chance to drag the Witch Queen out of our world and she took it. At least that's what I want to believe..."
As a seeress, Gudrun chose her words carefully, Lys knew. She said that she wanted to believe it, not that she did believe it. If simply telling yourself what you wanted to believe was enough to make you believe it, then Lys wanted to believe it too.
"Do what you mean to do," Gudrun told her. "Goodbye, Lys."
Lys placed her hand on Gudrun's arm as she gave him one last squeeze before withdrawing.
"What's she talkin' about?" Sir Burkhardt asked.
"I have to go," Lys said.
"Go? Go where?"
Lys nodded to Maus.
"Wherever he goes."
Sir Burkhardt turned her around to face him, holding her firmly by the shoulders as he told her, "He's an outlaw. Ye know what that means, don't ye? Anywhere he goes, all hands'll be against him. They'll be against ye too if yer with him."
"Then we go away," Lys replied, "far away, beyond the borders of the Eight Kingdoms."
"Lys, this is foolishness."
"And she is a foolish girl," a voice said. "Leave her to her folly."
It was Kolman. No one asked for his counsel, but there he was.
Lys had no patience for him and told Sir Burkhardt, "You should listen to the Court Sorcerer, Sir Knight."
"Ye stay out of this," Sir Burkhardt growled. "If only ye'd—"
"If only I'd what?" Kolman sneered. "Stopped her? And how should I have gone about doing that? Perhaps I should have lamed her like that whoreson dog over there."
"You could have tried," Lys said.
Kolman scowled at her and asked, "Well, was it worth it?"
Lys looked over her shoulder to Maus and her 'victory', if it could be called that, felt as empty as ever.
"Ask me again in ten years..."
"I don't imagine I'll ever see you again," Kolman said.
"I don't imagine you will," Lys replied.
"The child has her own path and she must follow it," Corothas said.
Sir Burkhardt looked at him and seemed to recognize that he was not going to dissuade Lys from what she meant to do.
"There's no changin' yer mind?"
Lys shook her head and Sir Burkhardt let go of her. He seemed at a loss for words before finally telling her, "Yeah, well, take care o' yerself then."
Lys managed a weak smile.
"You too. No selling poor Hänsel for ale money."
"An' hafta walk? God forbid."
Though it was a little awkward for her, Lys hugged the old knight and said, "Thank you. Thanks for everything."
"Don't thank me," Sir Burkhardt said. "I lied to ye. I wasn't hones' with ye 'bout me intentions."
"I know," Lys said, "but you stuck with me when no one else would. That has to count for something, doesn't it?"
"If ye say so..."
While she was at it, she hugged Corothas as well.
"Thank you," she said. "I don't think we would've made it this far without you."
"And have I done well by getting you this far?" Corothas asked.
"God only knows," Lys replied. "Speaking of which, where are Tristram and Ysolde? I figure I ought to tell them goodbye too."
"I ain't seen 'em," Sir Burkhardt said. "Maybe they've done gone."
"That would be like them," Lys said. "Well, you can give them my regards if you see them."
There was one more person left, but Lys did not feel like hugging him.
"Goodbye, Master Kolman," she said to her former teacher. "It doesn't look like I'll be able to pay you back Weißpfennig I owe you."
"You've cost me more than just one Weißpfennig," Kolman said, "but we'll call it even if this is the end of my obligation to Master Tancred."
"I'm sure he wouldn't want you held down by the past."
"It's what he did to you, if you didn't just dream up all that nonsense about saving those two."
"If it was a dream, it's been more of a nightmare."
"There is at least one thing we can agree on. Now go if you insist on it. Live out your nightmare with that traitor."
Lys held her tongue to keep from exchanging barbs with him. The anger, hatred and humiliation pouring out of him did not take a mindwalker to read. A lot of it had been there from the start and it had only gotten worse, like a festering wound. If there was anyone who could heal that wound, it was not her, not that he would let her try even if she offered. It was just one more thing to add to her sense of failure.
She turned her back on Kolman and all that could never be, paying Sir Burkhardt and Corothas one last look before she walked over to Maus. While she had been talking to the others, Prince Wilfried and his company had withdrawn, leaving Maus alone. The hand and the ear that had been cut off were left lying on the ground. If only she knew the right spell, she might have been able to restore them. She would have to do what else she could, meager though it was.
Standing behind him, she opened her waterskin and began to wash the stripes on his back. He flinched as she did so, weakly asking, "Who's there? What're you doing?"
"I'm binding up what was broken," Lys said.
"Lys? Go away. Leave me."
"I'm not going to do that."
"If you won't leave, then finish me off."
"I'm not going to do that either."
"Then you condemn me to the Living Shame too?"
"I want you to live," Lys said. "Whether it's in shame or not is up to you."
"Why?"
"My father wanted to save you, you and Loreley."
"Loreley's dead..."
"But you're not and I mean to see that you stay that way."
Maus simply growled in frustration. He was going to be a hard case, but Lys was not going to give up on him. She would see her father's will through as best she could with what was left here at the end of her quest, not just for the sake of his memory but for Loreley as well. If history remembered her at all, at best she would be condemned as a fool at best, a traitor at worst, but it was not the approval of people around her now not the chroniclers in the future that she sought. There was one life she would dedicate her life to. That would have to be enough.
