Chapter 135: Slow Progress
Simon deliberated on it for a day before he decided on public executions. Courtiers and Varten’s widow spent that day arguing that he should torture one or more of them to get to the truth so fervently that he was fairly sure that they were in on it, but he ignored them.
Not only did he have no plans to ever torture someone whose name wasn’t Varten Raithewait, but in this case, he was fairly certain that even those who weren’t directly responsible for what had happened deserved to die. He wasn’t a fan of killing innocent people, but none of the nobles he’d rounded up and named as dangerous co-conspirators had been innocent for decades.
He gave the condemned men a week to beg for their lives and throw each other under the bus while the gallows were built, but it was done; the sobbing men were still led out and hung in the town square where everyone could see. After the five of them stopped jerking and twitching, Simon stepped out onto the platform and made a speech.
“I didn’t ask to be put in charge of this town or this region,” he told them. “My wife… she died not so far from here, and though I won’t go into the details of that tragic day, I will say that it could have been prevented if powerful men had done the right thing.”
He continued as quiet onlookers listened without interruption. He explained that he hoped to leave in a year or two and that all he wanted to do was leave Crowvar better than he’d found it. There were no cheers when Simon left and walked back to the central keep, but then he didn’t expect any at such a solemn occasion. There were no boos or threats either, and that was enough for now.
Simon kept a low profile over the next few days, waiting to see if he’d made a mistake, but things got back to normal shockingly quickly. It was only when he was sure riots weren’t going to break out over what he’d done that he met with the remaining three dozen members of his impromptu mercenary and gave them all a different sort of speech.
For the last year, all he’d done was fight and then move to a new location to fight again, but today, he was giving them a different sort of message. “It’s time to dig in or move on,” he told them.
Some had obviously been expecting that message, but others were surprised by it and had hoped he’d return to fighting on the plains once Jak had recovered fully from being poisoned. Simon told those who wanted to leave and fight on their own that they were welcome to do so and that those who wanted to settle down and build something would be gifted acreage at his expense so they could start a farm or something similar.
Truthfully, much of the land he wanted to hand out had been seized from the men he’d just executed, but that wasn’t important. There was plenty of Raithewait land that currently laid fallow that anyone with a strong back might put to good use.