The rope hung like a question above the scaffold and the city held its breath around it. For a second the square was nothing but faces turned to the gallery, mouths half-open, waiting to see which answer the rope would give them.
“Call Gareth,” I said, because words steadied me when the world wanted to pull me apart. “Let him finish. Let Lysander speak. Let Corin show the tampering.”
Gareth pushed himself up on hands that trembled and coughed the breath of a man who’d been hollowed-out by blood. “They wanted a show,” he rasped, eyes bright with pain. “They said it would make the story clean. They told me to aim so I wouldn’t kill anyone. I was paid. They said a gentleman would come and watch.”
“Who paid you?” the guard demanded, voice flat but carrying enough cruelty to make a man twist
