Seraphs by Faith Hunter

Culpepper’s face, half wild hope, half angry despair, neither did he.
    Wearing rough clothes that looked as if he’d come straight from his claim, Ken sat, making the chair squeak, and was sworn in by the remaining guard. Waldroup said, “Say your name and address, and speak your piece.”
    “Kenneth Schmidt. I’m a miner. Got no mailing address, but I got a claim, duly registered with the claims office. I pay my taxes. I go to kirk every single meeting when I’m in town or when the weather allows me to trek in. I dated Thorn St. Croix once.” A buzz started in the room. Ken looked at me from under bushy brows. “I been looking for a wife, long time now. I got a good claim, I make good money, and I can provide for a woman and kids.” His heart was in his eyes, his whole soul there for me and the crowd to see. Ken Schmidt was in love with me, or thought he was. And he intended to save me.
    “We went to dinner at the Blue Snail. She had a salad and I had the spaghetti. And then I took her home.”
    “Did the accused at any time try to seduce you? Or indulge in inappropriate behavior, actions not suitable to a chaste and virtuous woman?” Shamus asked.
    “No, sir. She was perfectly, well, perfect. Just the kind of woman a man would want to take as wife. Honest. Kind, too. When I asked to see her again, she said it wouldn’t work out between us. She let me down all gentle like. And that’s all I got to say.”
    The next witness wasn’t so kind. I recognized him as a fiddler, one of the town’s musicians who played at early thaw feast days and holidays. One of the musicians who had played for the dancing Audric and I had won. And he had lost.
    When he had been through all the preliminaries, Eugene looked at me, met my eyes, and lied. “She and me been having an affair. She won’t let me alone. Calls me, comes to my door and window at night, climbs in bed with me and has her way. I’m ashamed and need to confess, need to clear the air and find a way to get free of her immoral hold on me. I want her locked up. That’s all I got to say,” he echoed Ken’s closing words.
    “When did the accused last come to you?” Audric asked.
    “This morning just after dawn.”
    Audric looked at the bench. “May I address the senior judge as a witness?” Shamus’ brows rose toward his bald pate, but he gestured permission. “As a baker, you must rise every day at dawn. Do you look outside?”
    Shamus nodded. “Check the weather, just like every businessman who depends on people being out and about. Bad weather, we get less customers, so we make less bread. Why you asking?”
    “Your bakery is across the street from Thorn’s Gems. This morning when you looked out, were lights on above the shop?”
    Shamus scratched his bony chin. “Reckon they were.”
    “And could you see in the windows?”
    “No, can’t see in from the street, what with the porch over the walkway. But come to think of it, there might coulda been some shadows moving. Why?”
    “The witness lies. Thorn St. Croix and I were practicing savage-chi and savage-blade from before dawn until eight o’clock. You saw the evidence of that movement in her windows yourself proving she was at home, not in the witness’ bed.”
    Shamus stared from Audric to me to the man on the witness seat. When he spoke, his voice was too low to carry off the dais. “Eugene. You want to reconsider your accusation?”
    Red-faced and uncertain, Eugene pulled on his collar as if it was too tight. “Well, maybe it wasn’t this morning.”
    “Some sweet young thing crawls in your bed and you don’t remember when? I don’t think so. Recant, or I’ll think you need some time to reflect. Maybe a long time to reflect.”
    Eugene’s breathing had sped up and a slight sheen of sweat beaded his face. When he looked at me, something malevolent swam in the depths of his eyes. “She’s a mage. Mages are all whores.” Voice filled with revulsion, he said, “She’s evil.