“And so, for the crime of Heresy, you are to be burned at the stake until dead.”
All in all, you could say his day started badly.
***
Mitt Larsen paced his cell.
He could hear screaming coming from one of the interrogation room.
In the cell next to him were two men. They were bound and hooded. The guards would take turns to spit on them, defecate in their food. At night he heard muffled screams coming from their and tried, hard, not to think about what was happening then.
***
The rules: Punishment is carried out 24 hours after sentencing.
He had one day to make his peace.
***
Mitt knew the risks he was taking. Teaching had become under Divine Right.
And teaching evolution, and belief in a world outside? Well, that was asking for trouble.
But teaching was in his blood. His parents had home schooled him, using his grandfather’s library. He had started teaching when he turned twenty.
Five years was a better innings that most got.
***
On the day of the Burning, a priest came to his cell with two Inquisitors. They tried to coerce a final confession from him. He had heard was to be “grueling.”
Knowing you are going to be tortured never prepares you for the brutality of it.
He withstood the beating, though. As his nose broke he considered the irony. He would have turned to God to comfort him at times like this. That thought almost made him cry, but the pain as they brought a mallet down on his foot was more pressing. It didn’t matter what they did to him. It wasn’t like he’d need to walk after today.
He was gagged, bagged and dragged out, in front of the press. He heard the cameras flash, but he could see nothing.
People shouted questions at him. They all took his silence as defiance. He heard the priest tell them that he was in league with Evil Doers and was unrepentant of his crimes.
At least they had the last bit right.
***
Eventually, he was strapped to the stake. The executioner talked while we worked.
“You’re not getting a sedative. You’re going to feel this. You’ll be alive when your belly splits, you’ll smell your insides cooking. You’ll not hear us laugh over your own screaming, but will be laughing.”
There was a wet sound, then. Followed by a thud.
The executioner stopped talking.
There were shouts of alarm, gun fire, an explosion off to one side – and then nothing save a high pitched whine.
Mitt waited. The silence was worse than the pain. He tried to call out, but the gag robbed him of his voice.
He was sweating – could feel his back wet; feel the drops running over his skin. He strained to hear.
Steps! Steps walking along the pathway to where he was waiting.
“This is it.” He sobbed. The wait was endless.
His hood was pulled off. He blinked hard against the light. Hands reached behind his head, loosening the gag.
“Sawy abaht the wait, there, mate. Bloomin guards didn’t kna whenna fawl dahn. KnowotImeen?”
Hands reached out to him, as Mitt Larsen collapsed sobbing and was carried to freedom.
