To Whip a Mockingbird

Caramine froze, distraught. I’d seen many faces of hers by now, but I hadn’t seen her look quite as lost as she was now.

I decided to speak up. “Miss Jupiter, I-I’ve been with Moonlight for over two weeks, and I can absolutely ascertain that—”

“Ascertain that what, thief? I have no interest in hearing from someone as compromised as yourself,” Jupiter interrupted.

I clenched my teeth. Behind Caramine, I saw Lotus and the other typhins pile in behind her. This was clearly going nowhere, fast.

“Is there anything else you’d wish to say before my advisors get back? You probably have at least a minute or two, if that pleases you,” Jupiter continued.

“You will not be getting any food for the next week, Aleare.”

What?

Caramine marched past me, her eyes locked in on the cook from last night. Did Caramine just say that? But why would she say that? Jupiter said.

“Leader? Leader, please, what are you doing? You know me, you know Ray, you know that never in my century of living have I even stolen fur off an animal’s pelt,” Aleare begged.

Caramine did not respond, and instead grabbed him by his upper arm, and began pulling him down the stairs. Merlum and Lotus dashed past me, trying to catch up to Caramine and Aleare, all the way to the bottom of the stairs, where Lotus froze. Did she think something was off?

Meanwhile, Caramine dragged Aleare towards the center of the square, where a small marble fountain sat gurgling in the dark. Merlum caught up to them and began trying to separate the two. A few people started watching the commotion from the perimeter of the square, people who looked like farmers and workers heading home for the day. Suddenly, Lotus broke out in a run as well, headed straight towards the typhins. But instead of joining Merlum, she began pulling Merlum away.

Why was she pulling Merlum away?

By now the rest of Moonlight was out of the town hall and headed down the stairs. I slowly followed them down, and finally made it down a minute or two later. That’s when I was able to finally hear Caramine’s words from the center.

“You, Aleare, have disgraced the name of Moonlight and become no better than the scum of Antares and the Roaches,” I heard Caramine say. “You do not deserve to be marked with our brand, the crescent moon.”

Aleare was on his knees. Merlum, held down by Lotus, managed to break free from her grasp and leapt back between the two typhins, when one of Jupiter’s advisors walked up behind him and grabbed him in a full nelson. Merlum fought back for a split second, before realizing who was grabbing him. He went limp.

The second advisor came and bound Merlum’s wrists in twine, then walked up to Caramine and Aleare. Caramine nodded. The advisor then bound Aleare’s wrists, too.

An audience had now formed on the edges of the square. Caramine noticed, and Caramine took her time. She paraded around Aleare’s kneeling, shamed figure, making sure to look every one of the Ardesburg villagers in the eye.

Then she unfurled a whip.

“Leader, please don’t do this,” I heard Aleare whimper.

“I have known you for nearly a century, Aleare,” Caramine said.

“So why are you doing—”

Caramine ignored him. “I have known you for nearly a century, and that is the only reason why you are not being left in the desert, where I left Azzerium to fend for herself. You have long been a trusted member of this band. That is what makes your infractions today all the more unacceptable.”

Aleare was silent now. He knew he couldn’t win. The rest of Moonlight was silent with him.

“Beat him up!” Someone in the audience cried.

“As punishment for your crimes, I will dole out twenty lashes. Your scars will never heal completely. They are to mark you permanently as a failure, someone who tried to conduct immoral business, the greatest crime of our people,” Caramine announced.

Mixed cheers erupted from the crowd, while I heard only gasps and one curse from Moonlight. One human child pushed against his mother to get a better view.

“This is wrong,” Merlum whispered frantically to me and Lotus as Caramine stripped a resigned Aleare of his green linen haori and tossed it aside. “Why are we doing this?”

“She’s making a show of not believing Aleare,” Lotus explained. “Because the Ardesburgians don’t believe Aleare.”

“But I was with him! Why isn’t Caramine also attacking me? Why isn’t Jupiter blaming me?” I said in a panic.

“You’re a human,” both Lotus and Merlum said simultaneously.

Then I could still try to stop it. I hobbled towards the scene, reaching out my hand. “Caramine! Please—”

The crack of the whip interrupted my words. Aleare let out a croaking gasp, and the crowd went silent. Jupiter smiled in approval while a few villagers started to shout.

Why this? Even if we wanted to put on a show of punishment, even if Aleare deserved a punishment, why this?

The next whip came, then the next. He was being made a spectacle, a piñata for people who just so happened to make high quality metal bars. I suddenly realized that his reality was being dictated by Jupiter and Ardesburg alone, and Caramine must’ve felt that she was no more than a conduit for that reality.

Another crack, and Aleare let loose a scream. He was shivering now, struggling to stay on all fours. The villagers kept cheering. Caramine did not stop. By this time, the entire market had come to watch. I couldn’t blame them. I couldn’t look away either.

“No matter what we say, Jupiter won’t believe us,” Lotus whispered, looking down on the ground. “Caramine’s trying to do anything to save the deal.”

“But we can’t,” Merlum whimpered. “I don’t know. This is so unbelievably wrong.”

Crack. Crack.

After what felt like an eternity, the twenty lashings were done. The soft metallic scales on Aleare’s back were now completely splattered and bloody, and many more scales laid scattered, uprooted from his skin, on the ground. His exposed skin laid in bloody stripes, and a smoky blue bruise had already begun forming around the lashes.

“Now get out of my sight, and return to the carriages. The hunters of Ardesburg will watch you as you go back,” Caramine said. She didn’t even untie his hands.

Jupiter clapped as Aleare slowly got onto his legs, then began wordlessly limping back towards the entrance of the village. A child threw a cooked yam at him, followed by another, before an adult grabbed her and took her away.

“My my, well done Caramine, you can say I am impressed by your commitment to proper values of honesty and transparency,” Jupiter said, as if she felt not even a hint of irony in those words. “You did not hold back with those lashes.”

“It is what needs to be done,” Caramine said, gritting her teeth.

“I am pleased with the way you stand up to the connivance of your people. So you have my own apologies. I was wrong about you, and your commitments.”

“It is the right thing to do.”.

“I like you!” Jupiter announced. “And so I am willing to keep the trial as specified in our contract. However, please have it be such that no typhins except you will be allowed to enter the gates, until further notice. I will allow your entourage to transport the goods to the gates, at which point we will take the delivery. With supervision, of course. Does that seem fair?”

“I am humbled by your generosity. Please do not feel pressured. I completely understand if you choose otherwise,” Caramine lied.

“I am making this choice without any pressure,” Jupiter smiled. “Again, I like you.”

They shook hands, and whatever remained of the crowd cheered again. One by one, the rest of the audience dispersed as Jupiter signed every page of the contract right there in the center of the square, until we were the only ones left. Except an advisor. One who was still grinning with morbid glee.

“I shall be off,” Jupiter said, handing the scroll back to Caramine. “My advisors will guide you back to the entrance.”

I could feel the second advisor behind us. Reluctantly, we as the rest of Moonlight stepped out from the side of the square, heads down, silent.

Caramine walked towards us and past me to whisper something to Lotus. Lotus shook her head. The typhin sighed, then walked back past me again. I looked at her. She avoided my gaze.