The Right to Die | ✓ Amby Winner 2023

24. The Right to Speak

The courtroom doors whined open. M'yu marched through, trying not to see the throngs in the stands, trying to keep his head straight on the destination—the Ring of the Accused, its marks embedded deep into the floor. The crowd murmured, bits of gossip floating over the court and into M'yu's ears.

"...so young—"

"...be expected from guttersnipes—"

"...scrawny little thing, isn't—"

"...glad to see it dead."

M'yu's foot stuttered, and the guard prodded his back. Electric candles ringed the court, lighting the stands from beneath, turning spectators into specters. They leered at him, shied away, leaned in hungrily. High in the stands, a girl stood and waved wildly before an older man gently tugged her down. M'yu's throat tightened. Ashya and Evriss. They'd come.

The guard shoved him forward again, and M'yu stumbled.

Rows ahead, the Magnate sunk into the width of two seats, smiling as if he'd finished a particularly satisfying meal. M'yu wasn't sure what he was so happy about; did he not know the Tsaright had betrayed him, or did he not care? Sviya sat next to him, her hands primly folded in the lap of a black satin dress. M'yu locked eyes with her pleadingly. Her gaze dropped.

The guard shoved him again, and this time, he ended inside the Accused's ring. When he looked up, Karsya stood across the room from him.

The train of her deep purple dress gathered at the edge of the Ring of Witness. At her neck, where their simple, polished rocks should have been, glittered a blood-red gem inset to a golden chain. M'yu's face contorted, lips pressed together, head shaking. Karsya kept her gaze trained on some point above his head, as still and ravishing and expensive as anything else that belonged to the Caps.

From his throne to the right, Tsaright Xten sat draped in black and royal purple. He banged a scepter on the metal balcony, and the crowds hushed. "We meet today in extraordinary circumstances. The man you see before you, Mykta z'Daras, has been accused by the Prav'sudja of habitual theft, of conspiracy, of treason..." Xten's eyes panned the crowd. "And of the murder of a Capital man."

M'yu's hand clenched as the Vulture's dark eyes shimmered in his mind. Whispers ran through the crowd. 

The Tsaright held up a hand. "His charges, unfortunately, are not the most extraordinary thing about this case. Two nights ago, the night Mykta z'Daras was apprehended, an attack was made against the Prav'sudja, rendering many of its necessary systems inoperationable. Our finest Capital Knight engineers are working on the problem as we speak, and have managed to restore some auxiliary functionality. The artificial intelligence system, however, has not managed yet to be restored." 

The crowd's murmurs rose again, and Xten raised his hand. "Peace, brothers and sisters! The law has a provision for such a case: his status, guilty or innocent, is to be determined by majority vote of any Knight in attendance. The burden of conducting the trial, though, and declaring his punishment, falls on me."

"No!" A high voice broke through the crowd, and M'yu spun. "The Prav'sudja cannot be prosecutor and judge." Sviya stood in the stands, a step away from her uncle's reaching paw. "Section 117a, the procedural law you're referencing"—she deftly stepped past a row of women's skirts, evading another reach from her uncle—"only includes citizen disputes, not crimes against the state!"

The Tsaright sighed. "Can a Knight apprehend this child, please? She has not earned the Right to Speak."

Sviya dodged another man's reaching hand, jumping down a step. "You're preluding—the trial hasn't officially begun. I don't need the Right."