carl@fire

The remainder of the drive to the long trade street was uneventful, and the girl who had been a princess until recently continued to think. She had a rich, vivid imagination, and it was tormenting her with the possibilities of what could have been another, better life had she simply been—

"Sure you don't wanna drive for this?" Carl asked again once the steamcar had come to a halt.

Mina sighed again, a pleased sigh this time for being brought out of fruitless daydreams, as she shook her head. "I appreciate that you've asked, but it seems you're a far more skilled driver than I, and there will be plenty of time for me to drive with as much speed as I choose once we leave the city." Yes, it would have been quite nice if that had been the case.

"Suit yourself," said Carl, using yet another one of his outworlder idioms. "Hang on, I'm gonna floor it."

The phrases were unfamiliar to her, but she immediately grasped their meaning. She brought her trouser-clad legs up and pressed her booted feet against the inside of the steamcar to hold herself firmly against her seat. Certainly not a posture I could maintain if I were to be wearing some silly dress as a girl my age should.

They began to accelerate. It was once again a smooth increase in speed, but this time they continued to accelerate. Soon, the steamcar was traveling much faster than Mina had ever dared to drive it.

"This is incredible!" Mina yelled, feeling an intense surge of excitement. She yelled her excitement to the world, heedless of anyone who might be listening.

Their speed continued to grow. Even with her goggles on, Mina could hardly even see the details on any of the buildings they passed!

She decided it at that moment.

She would become the Queen of Racing.

She must.

This was so much fun!

The street was very long, and Mina grew too tired to continue venting her excitement. She sat, eyes wide, breathless with awe as the city she'd lived next to her whole life zoomed past her at a speed that seemed impossible to believe.

Seatbelts were suddenly very high on her list of things to investigate. She imagined attempting to turn at such a speed, and her mind splatted against the brick wall of a nearby building.

The street could not last forever, though, and eventually the steamcar began to slow as it approached the end where one of the largest churches dedicated to the Goddess of the Dawn in the city was situated.

Mina frowned as the steamcar neared the steps of the church. Why is there such a crowd gathered outside at this hour? Is that a man in the pillory? Is that… No, it can't be! "Stop a moment when we get closer," she said.

They drew nearer, and even without the aid of her alchemically-enhanced vision she was sure she would have been able to recognize the man in the pillory.

"This devil sympathizer sought to lead his family astray, to turn them from Her holy light!" declared a woman in white to the side of the pillory, her attire identifying her as a priest of the Church.

"That's the gatekeeper, Percevale!" Mina said, pressing a hand to her mouth.

And it was. Percevale, one of the most well-known citizens in the entire city, even more so than some nobles, was staring out over the crowd of Dawn's faithful from inside a pillory.

How could this be happening? Mina stared. The only time they'd do something like this is if they intend to execute him!

"We knew him as one of our own," shouted the priest in a passionate voice, "a paragon of our community! Someone we all looked up to! But this is only proof that we must always remain vigilant! Even those who shine the brightest may be tainted one day by shadows!"

"Carl, we have to help him!" Mina said, trying to convey the urgency of the situation. They can't execute Percevale! He's a good man! "They'll—"

"Execution is the only absolution for a sinner who refuses to repent!" shouted the priest.

The people nearby cheered.

Mina felt her stomach twist. She turned to Carl, amazed by his apparent lack of concern, and grabbed his arm. "Carl, please!" she said. If it's you, I'm sure you can do something, can't you?

Carl looked down at her. "Don't worry about it. This is gonna be great. Just watch."

The statement staggered her. It will be great? They intend to kill a man, and it will be great? She stared at Percevale, struggling to think of something she could do.

But Mina was just an ordinary girl in times like these. She was skilled with mechanics, and reasoning, and several other matters, but she was poor with magic and lacked any power that she would need in order to prevent one of the few people she'd spoken to with any regularity from being killed in front of her.

She'd seen a man die in front of her before.

The memory had never left her.

"Father, please, you have to repent!" yelled a young-looking girl standing just to the side of the pillory that Mina recognized as the man's own daughter, whom she'd met and who seemed to adore her father. "You don't truly believe any of that, do you?"

"It's all true!" Percevale said in the same voice he'd used to greet newcomers to Charus City for as long as Mina could recall. "Every word of it!"

"No!" Percevale's daughter, Rikild, shrieked at him. "You're not my father! You can't be!" She clenched her hands at her sides as she continued to yell at him. "My father would never side with the devils! You… You must be an impostor! You should just die!" The girl hugged her mother, who had been standing behind her. One of her brothers put a hand on her shaking back to try consoling her.

How could she say that about her own father? Mina's brows were raised to their maximum. Percevale may drink a bit, sure, I've seen him in his "naps" at the guardhouse, but he's still a good man! He always took time to speak with me, even when I'd stop by as he'd begun to drink! Every guard I've spoken with has said they look up to him! Even the soldiers from the Royal Guard who served with him in the army say he was the best man they'd ever met! How can they just—

The executioner, marked as such by the emblems on the hilt of his blessed sword, moved closer at that moment, cutting off her thoughts.

"Have you any final words, sinner?" asked the priest.

Percevale brought his head up, a determined look on his face. "I demand the Trial of Faith!" he shouted. "End this farce! If my words are not true, let them be judged absolutely and not by those whose minds have been twisted by lies!"

Mina's breath stopped. No! Why, Percevale? Why would you… You know the Goddesses kill nearly all who invoke the Trial of Faith! The castle receives reports from the Archbishop regarding the frequency of it!

The people gathered in front of the church seemed to know the inevitable result of such a declaration as well and reacted accordingly.

The priest laughed. "Surely you know how vengeful our Goddess is, Percevale!" she called in a mocking tone. "How many devil sympathizers have lived through such a trial?"

"Those who speak the truth have nothing to fear!" Percevale retorted.

It was true, in theory. It seemed, however, that when the truth involved devil sympathizing in any form, there was only one possible outcome.

"Devil sympathizers never speak the truth, old man!" one of his sons yelled.

"Then may I be struck down like the rest of them," Percevale yelled back. "But give me the dignity to stand unfettered when I am judged!"

"Very well," the priest allowed. "In deference to the continued service you've done in Her name, we will grant you this last request. Basequin, be ready to cut him down should he try to run."

The executioner unlocked the pillory, allowing Percevale to come free and face his family.

The accused man looked to the sky, as was traditional when invoking the Trial of Faith, which called upon the deities to judge whether a person should live or die. "Oh, Goddess of Dawn!" he began.

Mina pulled hard on Carl's arm. "Carl, he will die if we don't help him!" she hissed. I know you can stop this! You can do anything, can't you?

Carl looked over at her and patted her hands that were clenched around the sleeve of his wide arm. "Mina, trust me," he said, his voice reassuring. "It's gonna be okay."

It's going to be okay? It's going to be okay?! "But—"

"Mina, you trust me, right?" Carl asked.

Did she trust him?

Of course she trusted him! Carl was perhaps the only person alive that she did trust! He'd randomly hopped into her life that afternoon, speaking knowledgeably of steam engines, and thermodynamics, and even aerodynamics, and then he'd defended her when she'd expected that her life was about to somehow become even more unbearable, and he'd stayed with her and encouraged her, and, and, and…

Mina nodded. Of course she trusted him.

Carl grinned. "Then just watch, okay? This is a heck of a performance, and you're gonna regret it if you miss anything."

A performance? Had she overlooked something? She looked back to the place where Percevale was pleading for his very life before any and all deities who were watching.

"Long was my faith shattered, my ability to have faith destroyed! But when He showed Himself to me in His splendor today, with His mighty spear and presence, I was changed! By His appearance, by His strength, by His compassion, I was reborn!" His head swiveled between his family and the rest of the Church's followers. "He will protect me! No harm shall come to any who are reborn by His grace if they speak the truth, no matter how impossible it may seem!" he shouted. "So I say to you, Goddess of the Dawn: if you still hold dominion over me, if a single word I have spoken is false, then let me be smote here before the watchful eyes of your faithful! Strike me down with all your power and fury!" Percevale held his arms up and stared upwards, awaiting the bolt of lightning or pillar of light that would surely…

Surely, at any moment…

The bolt of lightning would…

A pillar of light should…

Percevale couldn't possibly…

There was no way…

Mina stared.

There was no lightning, no light.

Percevale had survived? After being accused of devil sympathizing? And another deity had protected him because he was speaking the truth?

"See?" Carl's voice carried over the top of her stunned silence. "Nothing's gonna happen. He's fine."

Mina tried to say…

She looked to Carl. There was no way he could…

She had no words for her shock.

Percevale let his arms fall to his sides. "It's as I've said!" he shouted, facing the crowd and then pointing at himself with his thumb. "She cannot defend her lies so long as He protects me! Carl is stronger than that liar of the dawn!"

Mina's mind went completely blank.

Carl had protected him?

From an actual Goddess?

Nothing made sense anymore.

The statement was even more true when Carl once again pulled his giant spear out of the air itself, then turned around and put one foot up on the back of his seat and raised his magical weapon high like a beacon. "Percevale!" he shouted. His voice seemed to have taken on a more resonant quality, though she may have imagined it. "You've done very well!"

Mina had been just about to unfreeze her thoughts, but Carl's seeming acknowledgment that he had defended a man from a deity sent her mind reeling once more.

Percevale whirled around at the sound. When he caught sight of Carl, he fell to his knees in a gesture of supplication. "He comes!" he bellowed.

The assembled followers of the Church of the Dawn, who had come to watch a man be tried and executed for devil sympathizing, turned to face the one who had surely thwarted their goddess.

Was he even a man? Mina's thoughts roiled, her every interaction with—

"Stop!" came the magically-enhanced call of a familiar voice.

The voice snapped Mina out of her thoughts. Oh no!

"Unhand the princess!" shouted a captain of the Royal Guard, leading the fleet of steamcars which were barreling down the long trade street towards the church.

Mina reached up and pulled on the end of Carl's jacket frantically. "We need to go!" she yelled, her eyes wide. "Hurry!" My mother must have sent them to find me! No! I'll never go back!

"Open your eyes!" Carl shouted back towards the church. He settled back into his seat in the next moment, his spear once again gone, and pressed the go pedal.

This time, the steamcar accelerated in the manner to which Mina was accustomed, but then it continued to accelerate, going well past the speed Mina herself was comfortable driving at most of the time.

"The gates have already been closed!" the captain announced. "Leniency may yet be granted if you surrender!"