Lord Barker continued. "For her numerous, murderous crimes against the people of the village of Sylus. And for the murder of our very own Widow Winchester here in Dale's Peak."
Sienna snapped her head in his direction. The audience gasped. One petite woman, her face withered with age, put her hand to her mouth in shock. Sienna couldn't bear for them to think her guilty of such abhorrence. But what was worse was knowing she would be put to death without ever seeing Nikolai again.
Lord Barker walked toward her and unclasped her red cloak, whipping it off her body with a violent tug. The wind pushed the fabric of her nightgown against her body. He grabbed her arm and twisted her around, then tore the strap down below her shoulder, exposing her breast. She covered herself with her arms and hands though her back faced the crowd.
"Do you see!" He shoved her closer to the edge of the platform. "She has the devil's mark! She is his bride and colludes with him to cast sorcery against mankind."
More gasps and mumbling amongst the people of her hometown. Simple people could always be goaded into belief with something as small as a red birthmark as unusual as Sienna's. He needed little evidence other than that to condemn her to death.
He turned her body once more to face the horde and gripped the wrist of her arm trying to cover her exposed body. He tore the gown from both shoulders down over her hips to let it pool at her feet. Sienna closed her eyes, unable to witness her own humiliation as he exposed her bare and bruised body to all.
"Do you see how freely she gives her body as a bleeder? She gives herself to many vampires at once. Only a witch and a harlot would show such disgrace. This woman who was once a lady among our town gave all of it up for a life of the damned. To pleasure the immortals and to cast her spells."
It did not matter that it was all lies. It did not matter that she'd been taken by force and abused, then accused and wrongfully condemned. This was the queen's orders, to kill her in the most brutal of ways. First with humiliation and then with fire while the people of her birth looked on. The winter wind stung and prickled over her skin like a thousand needles.
One boy said, "She is a witch."
Another woman shouted, "Then burn her!"
"Yes, burn the harlot."
And that was all it took. The people of Dale's Peak had always shunned those who gave themselves up as bleeders. Lord Barker knew this. Volkov's prize of biting her ruthlessly in more than one place and leaving open, savage puncture wounds was all part of the plan to prove to the people of Dale's Peak that Sienna was nothing more than a whore for the vampires and an evil witch, deserving of a death on the pyre.
"Good-bye, Lady Sienna," whispered Lord Barker with a sneer.
She snapped her eyes open then spat on the true face of evil. He merely pulled a handkerchief from his coat pocket and wiped it away, nodding his head to the Legionnaires behind her. She was lifted bodily and set on the dais with the wooden pole along her spine. Her hands were bound behind it. Then her ankles were bound at the bottom. The ugly, contorted faces of the throng drove into her heart like a hundred daggers. Her naked and bruised body exposed for their condemnation only added to the damage to her spirit.
Sienna stared up at the gray sky, trying to block the angry cries and vehement demands for her burning death. There would be snow today. The wind swirled, stirring her hair around her face and her breasts.
"Nikolai," she whispered to the winter sky, wishing she could hold him one last time. With all her heart, she prayed he would survive somehow, that he would not mourn her death too long. That he would fight the cause against men like Lord Barker and vampires like Volkov, all in her name.
The popping and crackle of pine pulled her back to the present. She stared down where the torchman had lit the kindling at the bottom. The heat wafted up quickly. The din of the crowd died as the fire flared to life. The rising wave of heat blurred her vision as she stared at Lord Barker with his menacing glare.
A cloud of black smoke billowed up and choked her. She coughed, twisting her body to the other side, but there was no escaping the smoke and the imminent flames. The heat reached up to her toes and feet. A piercing pain shot through her body as the flames licked her skin, rising up her legs. She screamed, tears of pain streaming down her face. The fire danced high along her right leg and hip, a giant spark popping up on her cheek with a burst of pain.
Now she wished for death. Wished for the sweet release, for this pain was unlike anything she could imagine, her flesh being baked on the fire, the smell of her own skin melting away. She wept and stared straight ahead, hoping her heart would give out before the fire reached her face.