A sort of numbness held Géta in thrall. Between the cold and the difficulty of traveling while tied to a saddle, he'd entered a kind of state where his thoughts didn't penetrate very deeply, certainly not enough to speak. Not that his captors wanted his words.
During his more lucid moments, he'd managed to determine there was no way he'd be given a chance to escape. They may shift his hands to the front so he could grip the saddle, but they didn't let him get away with anything. Even when he relieved himself, three of the Inskiti surrounded him, backs to him.
The woman who'd been assigned to feed him shoved the spoon into his mouth, and Géta choked a little on what he'd been just about to swallow. He longed for the numbness; it hovered just out of reach. That numbness took him away from his current situation. Géta chewed as quickly as he could, the food making him a little alert, and swallowed just before the Inskiti woman raised another spoonful of food to his lips. He hadn't bothered trying to identify what this was, though it had the scent and flavor of corn. It had been ground, and the grains slid between his teeth and cheeks, similar to grits, though this seemed less like grits and more like a meal. The soupy consistency did little to endear him to the food, especially since it hadn't been flavored with anything.
He faced the camp, so saw when Enemy Mage left the fire. Géta watched the man's approach without a hint of fear, though not because of the numbness. More a sense of fatalistic acceptance of his lot. He was in Inskiti hands. More than likely, he'd be tortured once they reached the hold. There was no way to escape.
Enemy Mage went around to his other side and the woman set the spoon in the bowl. Covering Géta's mouth with his hand, Enemy Mage held Géta's head. Géta closed his eyes, and the Mage rocked his head until he opened them again. Enemy Mage scowled.
"You are behaving." He sounded displeased. "That is good for you. As long as you keep cooperating, things will go easy for you." The Mage looked upset about that possibility. "If you stop doing what you are told, I will make sure your bones hurt when I am done with you." An idea that evidently pleased Enemy Mage a great deal, for he grinned.
Géta swallowed the food in his mouth, just staring. His mind barely comprehended what the Mage had said, but he recognized the malice in the man's expression. It simply had no ability to cause him to fear. The numbness had seeped in. Enemy Mage gazed at him for a moment, gagged him once more, then smirked before letting him go and rising. Géta bowed his head, weary and too certain of his fate now to hold it up any longer.
The Mage gave a command in Inskiti, and the woman grabbed the bowl, leaving Géta. Someone else came over when he didn't move and shoved him down with a foot. Géta flopped onto the ground, not making a sound, and curled up on his side as much as he could, trying to catch the back of his cloak with his fingers to pull closer.
If he could have whistled the Gods' Will away from himself and replaced it with a death wish, he would have.
★
He sat in the dining hall with Asthané, mathematics work beneath his pencil while his Mage wrote a letter to someone. The scene didn't match what he knew in his waking life at this time, and Géta struggled to get free of the dream. Better to be awake and facing reality than trapped in what he felt certain, even in his sleep, to be a dream.
But the scene didn't dissipate right away. In a way, it had a kind of prophetic quality, as if the Gods were trying to assure him he'd have this again. It lingered as he scratched numbers out on the paper, glancing at Asthané with a feeling of utter trust and confidence. Even more than the vague awareness of his waking reality, it was these emotions which lent a stark unreality to the scene. He'd never ever felt such utter trust in Asthané—as if he could be positive in his future with his Mage. It filled him to a greater degree than any other emotion he'd ever felt in relation to his Mage. Asthané was many things to Géta, but he didn't think his Mage had ever been what he felt Asthané to be in this dream.
Then a strum of notes met his ears. He looked up and the dining hall swirled away in a cloud of mists to be replaced by a workroom. The circle on the floor was the same, so were the stencils hung on the walls, but this place chilled him as nothing else he'd ever experienced. More strummed notes filled the air, roiling the air above the circle as a crushing wall of despair weighed him down. Much more than the impatient foreboding he'd sensed whenever observing one of the workrooms—or even trapped in one with Owée—this was complete hopelessness, an insurmountable wall of helplessness.
And the only hope was in the strummed notes. Géta focused on them, sincerely expecting them to mutate into flute notes, since his music was his hope, but they didn't change. They continued to play as strummed notes. He sought their source, but they continued only to shiver the air over the painted circle, growing more forceful, as if by their strength they could give him the will to survive.
Then something cold touched his forehead, and he awoke, eyes suddenly wide, shocked by the touch.
To find dawn in the camp.
He shuddered at the all-over cold which had seeped through his clothing while he slept. The spot on his forehead lost prominence under this, and he squeezed his eyes shut, wishing not to see the Inskiti around the fire several paces away. Enemy Mage never put him near the fire. He curled up as well as he could while awkward on his side with his hands bound behind his back, and he couldn't keep back the fierce sob that shook him. It made his body tremble in a new way, and he wished for the strummed notes again, because they had given him hope.
His involuntary cry drew a response. When Géta opened his eyes again, it was to see Enemy Mage approaching. He cringed away despite knowing full well there was no escape. The Mage knelt and grabbed the front of his cloak—they'd grabbed his lighter cloak that required the pin and not his heavier button-front cloak which he wore on patrols or for any extended period of time in the cold.
Enemy Mage grasped his face over the mouth, edge pressing up against his nose so he almost couldn't breathe and turned his head to face the Mage. "Why do you have Gift reaction, musician?"
Too cold to feel any pain besides that which the winter air had set in his body, Géta glared at Enemy Mage, wishing the gag would allow him to bite the hand covering his mouth. It was a thick gag, though, and kept his jaw open and harmless. Enemy Mage scowled at him.
"You would be wise to cooperate. Things will go much easier for you if you do."
He jerked, trying to be released, but Enemy Mage yanked him more upright, holding his head. Géta gnawed on the gag, wishing he could spit in the Mage's face. They stared at each other for a protracted time, then Enemy Mage grinned with glee.
"Since you will not cooperate, I will deny you food." His voice lilted with extreme pleasure on this announcement. "There is one day of travel left before we reach the hold. One day without rations will serve to soften you for my other efforts."
Enemy Mage shoved Géta to the ground and rose. On his way back to the campfire, he spoke to the other Inskiti, who all proceeded to put Géta out of their minds, if their reactions were anything to go by. Géta curled up again, shuddering more. Tears seeped from his eyes, but he fought them back. He would not cry.
But, oh, how he wanted those strummed notes back. Or even discordant flute notes. Any music at all would have given him the hope he needed right at this moment.
★
Géta nearly fell when the floor ended beneath his feet. Enemy Mage laughed at his blindfolded clumsiness, taking the scrap of fabric off.
"Look, musician, your new home."
The stairs into the cellar had no railing on one side, which left a clear view of what lay below. It didn't look particularly sinister, but the simple wooden table in the center of the room sent a fresh chill down his spine. He was trapped. There was no escape.
At the foot of the stairs, the pair holding him let go, and he collapsed, unable to catch himself. Enemy Mage came down the last few stairs and knelt beside him as he pushed himself up a little, hands still bound in front of him due to riding.
"The niceties are over, musician." Enemy Mage grabbed Géta's hair and pulled until Géta's gaze locked on him. "You will do as I say or suffer the consequences. Up!" He rose, pulling.
Screaming, Géta scrambled to his feet, half-suspended by his hair. Enemy Mage used it to shove him around the table and into a corridor beyond. Oil lamps lit the dank hallway, and Enemy Mage jerked him into a chamber on the left. Within, Géta discovered a couple of contraptions. One looked like a wooden bed, its top in quarters with spaces the width of two fingers between them; its corners had leather buckle-straps and four wheels on the facing side. This took up fully half the room. Across from it, near the corner opposite the door, lay a body-shaped coffin; its open top revealed a multitude of nail-points. He didn't need to be told what that was for, and shuddered at the thought he'd be forced into it at some time.
"I came well equipped," Enemy Mage said conversationally as he jerked on Géta's hair. "All we Mages did. There is not a Borderfolk cellar without these tools now. We will begin with whips and . . . other delights." He sounded as if he couldn't wait to get started. "If you do not cooperate with me then, we will lock you in the nail box for a bit. Face-up, of course. I would like to keep your face pretty as long as possible. I so hate to torture someone who looks as if they have been abused, and already your face is marred.
"If you refuse to cooperate following the nail-box, I will have you whipped some more. It always whets my appetite." Enemy Mage paused as if contemplating this second session of whipping, humming a little, then took a short, sharp breath. "And if that does not induce you to cooperate, we will put you on the table here."
Enemy Mage jerked Géta's head, forcing him to stagger over to the table. "This is a lovely contraption. One of my favorites. Not quite as entertaining as drawing-and-quartering, but as close as one can come to it when our . . . guest needs to survive. Know what it does? I will tell you." More jerking, to the nearest corner. "These straps bind your wrists and ankles. As you see, the table's top is in four parts, and that is the beauty of it. Such a beautiful invention." Enemy Mage may as well have been admiring a piece of fine artwork, the way he spoke of the contraption. "As I was saying, you are strapped down, wrists and ankles." Tugging back, to face the wheels. "Each of these wheels controls one quarter of the table. Each quarter of the table is connected to a diagonal track. I—or someone else perhaps—can adjust each of these wheels as quickly or slowly as desired.
"Everybody has a limit on this table, musician. Everybody. I do not know if it can rend limb from body, but I would be most willing to try with this. If nothing else breaks you before this—and you may well be a particularly strong one, I know—this table will, particularly when I apply my whips as we stretch your limbs."
Enemy Mage jerked on his hair again, and he staggered around as he was pulled out the door. At the closed door across the way, the Mage halted, making a motion to one of the Borderfolk with them. Géta tried to turn his head, but Enemy Mage yanked his hair, pulling him into the room beyond.
"Bring a lantern or two."
The light from the door came into the room. Here, casks had been stored. Six on each side of the room; three on stands on the floor and three on racks above. None bore taps. Between them, across from the door, laid Iléena, naked, below a set of four shackles pinned to the wall. She didn't respond to their presence, and her chest rose and fell quickly, her body otherwise limp, her gaze a blank stare.
"Look closely, musician. This will be you with enough torture. Turn her over."
One of the sources of light—the one to Géta's left—settled on the floor and the Borderfolk who'd held it stepped into view. Expression impassive, the mundane Inskiti laboriously rolled Iléena over, revealing her back.
"Shine the light on her back."
The other stepped forward with the light he held and hung it over the woman's back. There wasn't much dirt, and what there was seemed to have caked in crisscrossed lines and spots on her back.
"She broke after the fourth whipping, after fewer than four half-an-hour sessions in the nail box."
Géta swallowed bile as the Borderfolk who'd rolled Iléena over turned her onto her back again. He didn't need to ask if the torture had stopped there. He didn't think she'd have been catatonic if it had. No, worse had been done to her.
"I, however, was not satisfied with what she had to say." If Enemy Mage had hoped to sound disappointed, he failed completely at it. A kind of quiet glee had entered his voice. "So I had her whipped again, then raped her. Sadly, the rape caused her to turn into this . . . lump." Enemy Mage huffed a breath. "She is to be sent on to the capitol when the army arrives. The Mages there will be able to strip her mind of every last thought she has ever had."
Without warning, Enemy Mage half-dragged Géta from the room. "You, my pretty boy, should give me much more entertainment. I so hate it when it is cut short as it was with your little Teesar/Vlantil." He jerked Géta down the corridor to the next door on the left and swung him in with a shove. "But I do not have the time or energy to begin today. You are spared for one night. I suggest, for your sake, you consider cooperating when we come to fetch you tomorrow."
With another push, Géta tumbled onto the floor. He rolled once and tried to scramble to his feet to attack, but Enemy Mage held up his hands, palms out. Géta slammed into a wall of air and dropped onto the floor.
"But if you choose not to cooperate, so much more fun for me." The Mage smirked and turned to walk out.
The door shut. A lock clicked.
Géta gazed at the thread of light beneath the door, too shocked to cry, scream, or beg.