02 - Iron Kingdoms W.. - Captain Spud Is Amazing

108.1.141.197
Extremely popular with the scrutators of the
Protectorate is the wrack. This cruel device inflicts
constant torment and suffering, allowing the criminal
to send “Sufferings Prayers” to Menoth. These screams
and cries of anguish, induced by both the savagely
serrated chains and the mind-muddling haze of
incense, are viewed by the scrutators as a spiritual
release for the penitent (and the not-so-penitent).
Indeed, those who wish to atone for their sins in the
hopes of some form of redemption volunteer for the
wrack and the days, or possibly weeks, of incessant
torment that it brings.
‘Jacking is a grave and brutal punishment reserved
for the basest of criminals. With this punishment, the
prisoner is manacled to the body of a steamjack, limbs
along limbs, and then the ‘jack parades to and fro.
The result is almost always death, and the extent of the
suffering depends upon how the prisoner is bound to
the ‘jack. Typically, the guilty individual is manacled
so that his limbs bend in the same direction as the
‘jack’s, but sometimes criminals are manacled facing
the construct, so that their joints do not bend the same
way. The steamjack’s movements immediately shatter
joints and usually tear the criminal limb from limb. At
the same time the ‘jack is scalding hot. Miraculously a
few criminals have survived this punishment, but they
are often little more than paralyzed, useless husks of
cooked flesh and bone. This is an especially popular
punishment in Khador.
More conventional death penalties are also
carried out throughout the kingdoms. Hanging and
beheading are by and large the most common forms.
In the Protectorate, death by fire is the leading form
of execution, though sometimes they actually boil
their criminals in cauldrons, pick them apart with redhot
pincers, or douse them in vats of Menoth’s Fury.
Possibly the slowest form of execution is gibbeting
where a criminal is hung from chains or a gibbet
or sealed in a hanging cage and left to die of thirst.
Sometimes the authorities may give him water and
let him starve to death. This is a favored method for
executing pirates or displaying undead Cryxians.
In Khador, the executioner’s axe remains popular.
The firing squad has also become an accepted method
of execution in Cygnar and Khador and is reserved
for criminals of great fame or notoriety, usually those
accused of military or political crimes. Many places
have local traditions such as drowning in Corvis or
burying criminals alive in Ulgar. Some wizards have
developed extremely unpleasant, lethal spells that
cause the victim to be eaten alive from within or
completely flay the victim’s skin from his body causing
him to die in bloody agony.
Khador, Cryx, and the Protectorate have also been
known to crucify and impale prisoners, and the former
two of these three kingdoms—and other various
places—sometimes restrain condemned criminals
in an arena or pit and beasts are set loose to rend
and tear them to pieces. Like most deaths, these are
spectacles attended by the public, and gambling and
other festivities are common.
Also used in Cryx, corpse binding is a specialized
torture requiring the intervention of Lord Toruk’s
priests. The criminal is slowly tormented to death by
necrosurgeon torturers at which point his spirit is
captured and bound back into his rotting body. The body
can then be controlled as a thrall, carrying the spirit along
in agony. Such thralls are just as effective as normal thralls,
but the screams and wails of the bound spirits make them
unsuitable for stealth and rather disturbing to the living.
Such spirits can speak, but normally they do little more
than beg for the release of death.
inequality under the laW
despite the efforts of king leto and other progressives, many
old laWs and ingrained traditions are diffiCult to Change. in
partiCular, it has long been the praCtiCe that those of noble
title are immune to proseCution on many petty offenses suCh as
drunkenness, improper speeCh, theft, burglary, or in some Cases,
extortion and assault. this immunity has been expanded in some
plaCes to inClude toWn funCtionaries or City bureauCrats.
bringing serious Charges against any landed noble or group
of nobles is a diffiCult proposition, and the evidenCe must
be overWhelming. this traditional “extra burden of proof”
involving the nobility is found in every kingdom to some extent
and Was partiCularly exploited in llael prior to the khadoran
oCCupation. in ord Castellans are similarly exempt from
petty Charges and Can, in faCt, retaliate laWfully on those
Who aCCuse them of “spurious Charges.” in khador anCient
familial ties elevate an individual to being “above the laW” in
many regions although in some Cases this is more a matter of
intimidation than legal preCedenCe.
Table 2–7 lists some crimes and typical punishments for
the human kingdoms. Cryx is not listed, for punishments
in that nation are almost completely arbitrary.
World Guide 129