A Trial by Conviction
Julien pointed at the four headless corpses.
"The culprit's already caught."
"He was nothing but a lackey. We still have to expose whoever gave the order."
"You're saying the real villain is someone else?"
"Obviously."
Chris drew a deep breath and swelled his chest like an angry rooster.
"The culprit is none other than..."
His finger stabbed up at empty air, then dropped.
"You!"
It was leveled straight at Shay.
"Heh. Heh. Heh."
Shay broke into an empty laugh.
"Knock off the clown act."
"It was you."
"I let it slide for Grain's sake, and now you're crawling up to sit on my head."
Rab spoke.
"Why do you claim Elder Shay is the culprit?"
"Think about it from the thief's side. He stole the Motaro on Elder Shay's orders, got caught, and now he's about to die. He was counting on Shay to cover for him if things went bad—and then some strange bastard pops out and tries to kill every last suspect. At this rate he's finished. Mouth bone-dry. Cold sweat pouring."
Chris licked his lips and raised his voice.
"And right then—right when terror had the thief shaking and his nerve was slipping—I threw him a lifeline. Tell the truth, and I'd see he got off with something like ten years."
He went on, glaring at Shay.
"Shay burst their heads before I could finish. What I never got to say, because of that man, was this: in exchange, you name the one behind it."
Julien drew his staff.
"So the moment Gary got as far as 'the one be—,' Shay filled in the rest and made his move."
Claudia and Melissa agreed. They drew their staffs and closed around Shay.
Shay still had room to spare.
"You have proof I'm the one behind it?"
Chris answered.
"What you just said is the proof."
"What are you talking about?"
"An innocent man doesn't ask if there's proof. That kind of talk mostly comes out of culprits."
Shay sneered.
"So you're admitting you have none."
"Mages don't hold a trial on evidence."
"Then on what?"
"On conviction. And my conviction says you're guilty."
"A dog of a trial. No—before that, who gave you the right to play judge?"
"Grain."
"Is Grain a cure for everything?"
"At the moment, yes."
"Why?"
"Because every magic tower on the continent, and every Ring Binder in them, has their life hanging on Motaro."
Shay appealed to his colleagues.
"A mage from another tower—in our tower!—is pinning a false charge on an honored elder, and you're just going to stand there and watch?"
Carmen and Britney looked troubled. Tower Master Rab seemed no less torn; he was biting his lip.
Chris spoke.
"You think Shay's guilty too."
Shay said, "I'm not. This is a frame-up."
Chris turned his gaze on Rab.
"He spent the whole time shielding the suspects. The moment I offered a way out and the thief moved to take it, he flipped a hundred and eighty degrees. He didn't even leave the killing to me. He stepped in and did it himself. Does that make any sense?"
Carmen, Britney, and Rab wore complicated faces. Their hearts were tilting toward Shay as the one behind it, but with no proof they hesitated. They did not want to corner a colleague on suspicion alone.
Shay laughed at them.
"Arrogant brat. You're going to take me in my own house? You think that's possible?"
Four Ring Binders stood against him now: Chris, and the three mages of Touleno. Shay could not handle that many alone. If his colleagues joined him, though, he could still win.
Chris set to persuading the Ring Binders of Rafunian.
"Shay got Motaro ahead of the rest because his lifespan was running short. That's how he became a six-Ring. And now three more have fallen into his hands. He's a single step from Ultimate Mage. What about you?"
Carmen's upper teeth caught her lower lip.
"What are you trying to claim?"
"If you shield him and he goes unpunished, my master won't supply Motaro to Rafunian. He'll bar you from the Sky Gate as well. You'll be left here. Just like this. Exactly as you are."
The mood in the room turned strange.
"Once every other Ring Binder has gone, you'll be the greatest mages on the continent without lifting a finger."
Chris clapped.
"No other tower to watch, no other mage to step carefully around. You'll have the whole continent in your fist, to twist however you like. Sounds like fun."
An ugly tension hung in the air.
"Me, I learned magic and climbed the realms through pain you wouldn't believe. Every time my skill jumped a stage, it hurt so badly my teeth ground together. But other mages, I hear, feel pure rapture every time they rise. They say advancing a realm is like a drug. The way the rich want more money, the way a collector wants more things to collect, a mage hungers to rise. And since your lifespan stretches along with it, how could they help it?"
Shay's face twitched with irritation.
"You're just going to keep listening to him?"
They kept listening.
"Once all of us have gone up, the ruins will be sealed. Obviously. The road to Motaro gets cut off at the root. You won't raise your realm any further, and if you can't raise your realm, you can't lengthen your life. Playing king down here isn't forever. How many years do you think you've got left? Thirty? Forty? Fifty? When your time is running out and you're sick with dread, do you really believe Shay will hand over the Motaro he stole? That he'll split it with you?"
The current had reversed completely. Chris landed the finishing blow.
"Did you know? Grind a Ring Binder down and refine him into Motaro, and what comes out is extraordinarily potent. Twice the strength of ordinary Motaro. I'm of a mind to suggest to my master that the Motaro made from Shay be given to Rafunian."
The board flipped. The instant Shay felt it, he charged. Chris sheathed his whole body in mana and stepped into his path.
"Move!"
A mana bomb detonated point-blank.
The blast caught Chris and sent him tumbling backward. He rose clutching his arm, blood running from his lips—and yet his face was perfectly at ease. Shay's, by contrast, was twisted with panic. His colleagues had joined the Touleno Ring Binders and closed the net around him.
Shay appealed to old feeling.
"You're really going to do this?"
Carmen swept her red hair back.
"Commit a crime, and you take the punishment."
"Fuck."
Shay fought with everything he had, right to the end. Alone, he could not break seven Ring Binders.
3. Asking for Help
Alice had slept rough in the plaza for four days, waiting for Chris. The face that had shone with hope when she first arrived was now blotched with disappointment and worry. One careless touch looked as if it would break her into tears.
The sun went down, and the moon climbed high. Around her there was no one but others camping out the same way. She wiped at the corners of her eyes and stood. The road that ought to have been a happy one—the road to her family—was sad, and bleak.
She put on a bright performance for her mother and stayed two nights. She pressed the money she had saved into her mother's hand, though the woman tried to refuse it, and then returned to the tower.
In the little house of her own, the one assigned after she reached the Jenyeom realm, Catherine was waiting. Her face was bright with expectation too. But the moment she saw Alice's downcast expression, her own darkened fast.
"You didn't meet him?"
"No."
The two of them sat without speaking for a while. Then Alice opened her mouth.
"I waited four days, and Chris never came. But something happened on the day we'd promised, and I can't get it out of my head."
"What?"
"A mana bomb went off. Thirty people dead or hurt."
"A mana bomb means someone in the Chukhwan realm did it..."
Catherine tilted her head and went on.
"Right now every Chukhwan is tied up doing whatever the monsters in the ruins tell them. Either that, or they're red-eyed chasing Motaro. They shouldn't have the leisure to set off a terror attack in a plaza."
"That's what bothers me too. Do you think it has something to do with Chris?"
"I don't know."
The rims of Alice's eyes reddened.
"Is he dead?"
"..."
They sat for a long time with bleak faces.
Alice carefully changed the subject.
"Hey."
"What?"
"Your face. Segorin's dead, so you can fix it now, can't you?"
Catherine smiled bitterly and touched her cheek.
"After the marriage talks fell through, my father cut off his support. Now I'm a poor Jenyeom, same as you."
Her face was ruined so badly that only a mage who specialized in healing could restore it, and that would cost a great deal of money.
Alice's expression darkened all at once.
"I'm sorry."
"What do you have to be sorry for?"
"The money you lent me... it could have gone to treatment..."
Catherine cut her off.
"You don't have to pay it back."
She stroked her own face and smiled.
"I've gotten used to this face. It's fine."
A ruined face could not possibly be fine. Alice bit her lip to keep from crying. A groan leaked out between her clenched teeth.
Chris froze Shay's corpse—head and limbs already severed—until it was hard as stone, packed it into a large box, and shouldered the load.
They had offered him a teleportation circle at Rafunian Magic Tower and told him he could be back in no time. He refused, on the excuse that they ought to spare the mana stones it would burn to run. From where he stood, there was no reason to hurry.
As he walked, he turned over everything that had happened.
If I'd handled it this way, I wouldn't have been taken in. If I'd handled it that way, I never would have landed in a crisis. If I'd carried myself differently, I could have slipped free of the danger far more easily.
He was still chewing through regret and self-reproach when he set foot on the border of Mick Magic Tower, and a strange thought rose.
Him...!
His head rang. He stood blank for a long while, and only after ten minutes did he start walking again.
When he returned to the cave, Grain was sweating as he manufactured Motaro. Chris set the box down and drew out Shay's torso.
"It was this one's doing."
He gave a brief account of what had happened at Rafunian Magic Tower. Grain listened, letting out the occasional exclamation of admiration.
"Were you really going to kill all four suspects?"
"I hadn't decided, at the time. I expected that if I pushed hard enough, either the thief would open his mouth, or the hand behind him would move to shut it before he could."
"And if the thief had a backbone? Or fierce loyalty? Or if he'd been brainwashed, and kept his mouth shut tight?"
"I might have killed them all. Either way, the thief would have been caught. My task would have been done."
Grain applauded. Clap, clap, clap.
Being applauded by that man was deeply unpleasant.
"Killing every suspect isn't something to be praised."
"You're finally thinking like a mage. That's what I was praising."
"Is killing the innocent a mage's way of thinking?"
"Yes. That is exactly what a mage is. For the sake of the goal, you don't pick and choose your means."
He added it with a coarse laugh.
"Toss morality to the dogs."
A man who throws morality to the dogs—what is he going to do to me?
Chris smiled as he asked.
"What is it you want from me?"
"For you to learn magic and climb high into the sky. That is the only thing I want."
"Not talk about grabbing at clouds. Please be specific. If I know beforehand what I'll have to do, I can prepare for it, can't I?"
Chris bowed his head.
"I'm asking in earnest. Please tell me what you want."
"I already told you."
Wrinkles that almost seemed kindly gathered at the corners of Grain's eyes.
"What I want is for you to become a mage who goes past excellence and into greatness."
"Didn't you say you'd give ethics to a dog?"
"A disciple is the exception."
Chris felt stifled.
"Do you mean to deceive me all the way to the end?"
Moisture gathered in Grain's eyes. As if the frustration were too much, he struck his own chest.
"Why won't you believe me?"