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Justice
It was always children who came to a hanging first.
Ironic perhaps that it was spring; the season of life to be marked with death. Ironic that a new generation, born into a world free from war (or genocidal wars at least) would be so fixated with one's death.
Death...it was something that every man, woman and child of Lordaeron had once faced, in the conflict now known as the Second War. It was a prospect these children knew nothing of. Old stories, exaggerated to make their parents sound braver, the Horde scarier and in the end, empty threats to make them behave. The Horde had certainly existed...the upcoming hanging was testament to this, but all orcs nowadays were either dumb animals inside internment camps as petty thieves and bandits outside of them. Case in point, the criminal receiving its final judgement in the village church.
As if the Light would show mercy to such a brute...
Soon, people began to fill the town square, or at least ensured that their errands took them past it. Gossip filled the area, as to whether the brute would be lucky and have his neck broken by the fall, or be left to hang like a fish out of water. They of the elder generation did not revel in death in the same way the youngsters did. But against one of those who'd once fought in a war of extermination against humanity...they would be happy to see justice done. For the people who'd lost a sheep to the orc...and for all the lives he'd taken previously.
And then it began.
Four footmen surrounded the orc, their tunics in black rather than the traditional white of Lordaeron. The knight who'd accosted the thief was present also, along with a priest being present for tradition's sake. "Waste of time" was the most common comment on that. All knew the orcs willingly wielded fel magic, and were beyond the Light's blessing. Even thins gangly orcs such as this one. Thin, ragged, head held high...a far-cry away from the monsters all knew his kind to be.
The orc reached the platform, and the crowd waited for...something. Something that never came. No screaming mother, no wailing children, no final curse or prayer from the victim. Just an uneasy silence. Silence filled by the prisoner staring over the crowd in wary defiance. His eyes were devoid of the usual hellfire that gripped his kind, but it was unsettling nonetheless.
It happened quickly. A short drop, a sudden stop, a sickening crack and numerous cheers, mainly from the children who'd only heard of the brutes in bedtime stories. And then...it was over.
Justice had been served.