As the winner of the Royal Lots approached the coronation cloth, Senior Executioner Crocken tapped his partner on the shoulder.
"Let's go," Crocken growled. "She doesn't need to be looking at us right now."
He and Jantos moved towards the palace, skirting around the musicians. They took up station in the shadows of one of the huge ornate columns that decorated the front of the building. Here they would be out of sight, out of mind, but still close enough to listen, and to keep an eye on the rapidly cooling body of the old king.
Senior Executioner Jantos immediately sat down and took out a black cloth and began cleaning the royal blood off his axe. "Three damn strikes, I should have done it in one," Jantos berated himself.
Crocken ignored his partner and watched the coronation. He was listening to see whether or not the new King would accept her Lot. If she denied it, he was going to have to go back down there and shout his lines again to formally re-start the dance.
She seemed to make up her mind relatively quickly, and accepted, so Crocken relaxed. He scratched his beard underneath the mask.
Jantos was still complaining. "Wouldn't've happened if my aim had been better… blasted vertebrae!"
"You did fine, Jant," Crocken reassured.
"It wasn't how I wanted it to be," Jantos fussed. He glanced up from his axe, yellow eyes flashing through his eyeholes. "I wanted one clean smooth chop. Bam! Fin!"
"You were plenty clean," Crocken pointed out, "Same cut, all three times. I saw. That was skill."
"Pah!" Jantos protested, "It don't matter how accurate the second and third one was if the first strike was sloppy. I'm not gonna get another go at it. Killing a King is a once-in-a lifetime chance."
Crocken snorted, and turned his attention back to watching the crowd.
"You get to wave the wand and say the lines every time," Jantos persisted, "but the Reaper picks a new axe-man every year. That was my one shot, and I blew it."
Crocken didn't bother saying that four years wasn't "every time", he just tried to ignore his partner.
Crocken could see the outline of the dead king under his cloth clearly. The people sitting closest to the old king had cleared away as soon as the ceremony had started, and now that people were up and dancing for the new King, the old king's table was completely empty.
Jantos fell quiet, and put away his now-gleaming axe.
They both waited in silence until the new King was led into the palace by the royal advisers.
"Right then," Jantos said with a sigh, "I'll fetch the clean-up crew. I want to get this done, unmask, and go have a drink."
"Make sure you don't complain about work unmasked," advised Crocken.
Jantos glared back angrily for a moment, then his shoulders slumped. "You're right. I'll drink at home tonight," he conceded.
Crocken watched Jantos walk away. He resumed watching the motionless lump under the black cloth. He didn't feel bad for the dead king. He didn't feel pity for the new King. Dying was just part of what a King was. Some of the other guild executioners had high ideals about what the Regicide meant. They would say it was their duty to continually purge corruption from power. They would say that the certainty of the axe would focus the King on the higher purpose of governing well and creating a legacy. Crocken wasn't so sure about any of that. He thought it was just a tradition. A particularly visceral and emotional way to put the past year to rest, and let people hope that the new year would be better.
After a while, he saw Jantos return leading four junior executioners. The juniors had a stretcher. They loaded the shrouded king onto the stretcher, while Jantos made sure the head was secure. Crocken noticed when Jantos discreetly examined the neck.
Most of the people celebrating the festival had moved off. Now that the new King had gone into her palace, the focus of the festival had shifted to the orchestra and people were dancing below the terrace, under the trees in the square. Still, a few people were always more interested in death. A small procession of curious folk formed behind Jantos and the Juniors as they carried away the old king towards his appointed undertaker's office.
Crocken checked the wand, and then exited the square himself by a different route.
The dark streets were largely quiet. Every now and then, music and laughter would pour out of an open window where some people might be celebrating the new year in their own way, but for the most part the city was quiet. The usual night life was concentrated into the festival.
Crocken reflected that it would probably be a big night for stealth burglaries. He would be dealing with that aftermath tomorrow. Actual executions were a relatively small part of the responsibilities of the Guild of Executioners, and most of the rest of the time they were expected to make themselves useful by assisting the courts and the kingship with the enforcement of laws and the investigation of crimes. Routine policework was most of the job, and it was only so very rarely that an executioner got to wave the magic wand to prove that a freshly decapitated king wasn't a trick or an illusion.
The wand had to be returned back to the guild headquarters before midnight. That was the rule. Crocken picked up his pace even though he knew he still had plenty of time. The Reaper had no patience for tardiness.