Soter stacked another blue block onto the tower of wooden blocks, hoping to distract himself. His hands trembled as he placed it. The whole room seemed to shiver with the light of the candle he had set in the middle of the floor, long shadows leaping up the walls.

Soter finally let go of the block and the whole tower came crashing down. He looked at his hands. They had gone splotchy with blue, purple, orange hues, and they seemed to have taken on a life of their own, for no matter how much Soter tried to stop them they would not stay still.

“Why won’t you calm down?” he asked them.

Suddenly he heard the plap-plop of slippered footsteps outside his room. They fell quiet at his door. His breath caught in his throat. The door creaked open. Soter saw a tall shadow walk in, a silhouette against the daylight shining in from the opened door.

“I heard that. You talking to your hands, boy?” the shadow said in a gruff man’s voice. He walked over to the curtains. “Why do you always draw these, eh? It’s broad daylight.”

He opened the curtain and light of the midday sun poured in, revealing the long silks and brown stubble of Mitero, one of father’s servants.

“I don’t like it open,” Soter said.

“Never mind. It is time. Your father wants you,” he said.

Through those words, his father’s voice commanded the same obedience that it always had. Soter dared not refuse him.

Mitero had also been a soldier once, Soter recalled, but not his father’s. He spoke with a funny accent and people would often remark that he was from the West, as if it were something to be ashamed of.

Soter followed Mitero through the hall as his blue cotton slippers plap-plopped ahead. Walking down the long halls of the family palace, Soter’s mind latched on to anything it could to distract itself, to anchor itself to resist the dreadful tide. The sun shining through the curtains made them a lovely red. The flames flickered in torches lining the hall. Why were they burning at this time of day? He could smell the charred wood. Now he came to the stone faces that lined the hallway, the ancient, bleached-white eyes of those men staring down at him. Old great grandfather Kevan with a neck so fat that it looked like folded cloth, Grandfather Julian with a shaven head and a cross hanging on a chain. At the end of the hall was a statue, smashed and vandalised such that the face was unrecognisable, with crude charcoal drawings of genitals and obscene words over what remained. He would never forget when he asked his father about the one that had been defaced. Why don’t we restore uncle’s statue father? Soter had said, if you want our house to be respected then why let everyone see this disrespect?

Because forgetting one’s history makes one weak. Men are disposed to patterns of behaviour, my child, and if you forget the consequences of these patterns you will suffer for it.

Mitero took him to the end of the hall and threw the twin wooden doors open, then retreated to a corner of the room.

“Ah, my son.”

Soter’s father strode up and wrapped one arm around him, the regal silken robe covering Soter like a blanket. He walked the boy towards the balcony, where Soter could hear the roaring, chanting and clapping of the crowd. Never had he heard anything so loud. He threw his hands over his ears, but his father pulled them away. They didn’t stop walking forwards until they were at the very edge of the balcony, so close that the boy could see all the people gathered below. There were so many, so loud, and the warmth of air that rose from them carried the stink of thousands of unwashed bodies and rotting mouths.

Now that they could see the Consul, Soter’s father, they roared all the louder. Soter was reminded of the great roars of dragons in the old tales and why so many would-be slayers lost nerve and fled from them. His father opened his arms as if to embrace the crowd in its entirety. The boy looked up at him. His chin was lifted and he was smiling. There were almost tears in his eyes.

The Consul shouted in a booming voice that silenced the crowd. “My people. We are gathered here to now witness justice. As God most mighty has decreed, all those who break the rule of law must be punished. These men before you have broken the tenants of the Code of Narses by disobeying their rightful masters. For this criminal act, I, the Second Consul Alexander of the House Kronne, condemn these four people to lawful and holy punishment.”

The boy watched as his old house servants – the four of them - were paraded through the crowd onto a wooden platform.

Remember, Soter, be brave. Your father will make you watch. For my sake, don’t cry, Isaura had said when Soter’s father had first sent the soldiers to drag her away. She had been a mother to him ever since he lost his own.

The condemned lined up at the base of the platform. The executioner lifted his bronze facemask to ask forgiveness. Isaura bowed her head, while the others ignored the plea.

“Father.” Soter said. “Father! Father! Stop. Please. She doesn’t have to- You don’t have to do this!”

The Consul didn’t hear him over the sound of the crowd.

“Father!” He tugged on his robe, but he was only pulled aside by one of the guards.

“Father! Father!”

Isaura was the first. She marched up to the platform. A soldier held the woman’s hands behind her back. Then the executioner took a glowing knife from the fire. He held the back of the prisoner’s head and inserted the knife into the prisoner’s eye, moved it around in the socket and tore out a lump of white-red while the condemned cried bloody tears. Her fingers, held behind her back, contorted. The executioner did the same for the other eye. The boy didn’t turn away, though tears blurred it all he could imagine what was happening from the screams. He knew his father wouldn’t be pleased if he turned away. But he could feel an ache behind his eyes. He had never heard a person in so much pain.

For all his distractions, he couldn’t avoid this. He couldn’t avoid this scene etching itself so deep into his mind that he would never be the same again.