5 Embraced by Hell (2/2)
For a whole hour, Klaus wept tears of rage and bitterness, cursing Fehl for playing him so. But at the start of the second, he stood up and walked out of the door. His red, moistened eyes faced Kilian with a contrasting, stony gaze.
”Kilian, I'm sorry,” Klaus stated, even as his tears trickled down.
”Don't be; I wouldn't be,” Kilian replied in a matching tone. Hearing this, Klaus curled his lips into a smile and stepped out. Kilian closed his eyes. There was only one way to execute the Fehl-tainted, formulated by the Grand Orders, and upheld by the Arcadian Dynasty: The Baptism of Fire.
Klaus returned half-an-hour afterward, personally binding and leading Kilian toward the execution ground. In the middle of Kars, the stake awaited with rabble gathering and nobles observing from a distance. Klaus could have taken care of this privately. But bolder than the average noble, he planned to use the event to increase his prestige, by openly putting justice above family ties, thereby milking Kilian for one last time.
Before the common rabble and nobles, Klaus tied Kilian on the wooden stake, then turned to face the populace, speaking eight words the nobles would firmly engrave in their minds.
”Even my son is not above the law!” Amplified by a minor sound spell, the words thundered throughout the execution grounds, gripping the thousands of gathering commoners.
And with that one declaration, Klaus snapped his fingers, instantly setting the stake ablaze. This was no ordinary flame. The ”baptism” required the tainted to burn for three hours, not one more, not one less. And so Kilian watched the flames rise from the bottom of the stake to embroil his legs and make a slow rise toward his head.
It hurt.
It hurt like hell.
Hurt so much that his mind snapped, that his howls died in his throat, becoming frenzied laughs that alongside his third, crimson eye, gave him the look of a maniacal devil. Spurred on, the rabble tossed stones at Kilian's burning frame, but when compared to the flames searing his flesh, how could they matter?
The guards promptly contained the rabble's rage, returning order to the Baptism of Fire and ensuring nothing would derail the burning. Kilian couldn't close his eyes, they swept the gathered individuals, going from one face to another until they locked back on Klaus'. There, he stopped. At some point, it seemed the pain reached such a threshold that Kilian's brain forced him into analgesia, allowing him to spend the final minutes of the ”baptism” without agony.
Klaus faced him all along, not missing an instant of the three hours long burning.
”I do not want to die,” Kilian whispered as the fire covered his chest. On the scene, only Klaus could hear the words.
”I will not die. Even if I must claw my way out of the pits of hell, I will return, and drag you into a cage of eternal damnation.” It was a statement, a promise, a pledge, Klaus welcomed it with a faint smile.
”I will be waiting,” he accepted the improbable challenge.
Red light flickered within Kilian's crimson eye. The third hour ended, bringing alongside it a dazzling conflagration that burned what remained of Kilian into ashes. Thus, for the second time, Kilian perished.