hypocrite. I’ve killed before, and these are no innocent men. If we were out on the battlefield, I would easily fight them to the death. If they cornered me on a dark night in Jerusalem, I would’ve shot them dead then too. But seeing these men lined up, their wrists bound—this would be an execution.
I am no executioner.
War stares at me for a long time. Eventually he makes a sound low in his throat and gives a shake of his head, like I’m the damnedest thing.
“Abi abē vuttive eṭu naterennē nek, keki evi abi saukuven genneki, aššatu.”
If you will not take your justice, then I will take it for you, wife.
The horseman prowls towards the men. Seeing him move I remember that this is who War is. And unlike humans, I’m not entirely sure the horseman can change. He certainly doesn’t want to.
My attackers shrink back from him, but there’s nowhere for them to go. They’re hemmed in by the crowd and the phobos riders.
As War approaches the three men, he withdraws a sword from its sheath at his hip. It’s not the massive sword he wears on his back. This one looks lighter and narrower.
“Avā kegē epirisipu selevi menni.”
You get my unclean blade, War says, his voice building on itself.
“Gīvisevē pī abi egeurevevesṭi pæt qū eteri, etækin abejē kereṇi pe egeurevenīsvi senu æti.”
In life you were dishonorable, and so your deaths too will be dishonorable.
The guttural sounds of his words make him all the more terrifying.
“Please,” one of the men begins to beg. “We didn’t mean it.”
The one on the left is noticeably trembling.
But it’s the man I recognize who lifts his chin defiantly, his eyes on me. He doesn’t look repentant, he looks angry. “Whatever that bitch told you, it’s a lie. She wanted it.”
War closes in on the man, and he grabs his jaw. “She wanted it?” This time when he speaks, he doesn’t bother speaking in tongues. We all hear the words perfectly enunciated.
The man glares daggers at the horseman, but he doesn’t respond.
After a moment, War lets the man go, and begins to rotate away.
In a flash of speed, the horsemen turns back on the man, and with one vicious stroke, he sinks his blade into the man’s stomach, impaling him with it.
I jolt at the sudden violence.
My former attacker lets out a choked cry, and his two co-conspirators shout in surprise.
War releases his grip on the sword, letting the hilt jut out from the man’s abdomen.
The man sways for a few moments, then falls to the ground, a growing patch of blood blooming from the wound.
“Does that feel good?” War asks, again making himself understood. He looms over the man, the blade still sticking out of his victim. “I hope it does. I bet you wanted my sword shoved inside you just as much as Miriam wanted yours shoved in her.”
Dear God.
I’d forgotten about the horseman’s savagery.
The man’s mouth moves, but all that comes out is a strangled moan.
The warlord’s attention turns to the two remaining men. As soon as his ferocious gaze fixes on them, they both visibly wither.
War grabs the hilt of his sword from the dying man’s abdomen, and jerks the blade out, the action making a wet, sloshing sound.
The horseman steps up to the most frightened of the remaining two, and without ceremony, stabs him in the stomach. Almost mechanically, he withdraws his sword and moves to the next, repeating the action until all three of my attackers lay dying in a pool of their own blood.
I gaze down at them in horror as they writhe and moan on the ground. The horseman mortally wounded them, but he didn’t instantly kill them, leaving them instead to suffer.
War casts his violent eyes on the crowd. “Anyone who lays a dishonest finger on another woman will suffer the same fate.”
He turns to me and gives me a nod.
Revenge and justice are one and the same, he said.
Perhaps this is the very reason the world is burning. After all, if this is War being just, then his God’s justice makes sense too.
I don’t immediately return to my tent. Instead, I make the familiar journey back to my original quarters. Call it morbid curiosity or call it closure, but I want to see the place where I was attacked. I want to see if the earth is stained red with the blood that was spilled, or if the ground has already returned to normal.
I don’t know why, but the urge presses on me.
About ten