Torches flickered along the perimeter of the municipal square as twilight deepened into purple dusk over the snow-capped roofs.
The three condemned clerks knelt upon the damp cobbles before the fountain, their hands bound behind their backs with coarse hemp cords.
Vella stood at the edge of the clearing, gently resting her palms on the sick girl's shoulders to keep the child facing away from the center.
"Turn your eyes toward the clinic lamps, little one," she whispered softly, shielding the girl's vision with the fold of her traveling cloak.
He stepped forward into the circle of torchlight, uncoiling thirty feet of linked silver from his right forearm.
"For four years of documented extortion, starvation of the innocent, and complicity in murder, the provincial tribunal sentences you to death," he proclaimed, his voice echoing across the silent gathering.
