The Robber Knight's Secret

35. The Dungeon

"The... the dungeon?" Ayla asked timidly.

"Yes." Reuben nodded.

"But you said you were the Emperor's friend! How could he—"

"I was a favored vassal. That is by no means the same thing as a friend. But you're right, he probably wouldn't have thrown me into the dungeon." The corner of Reuben's mouth quirked up in a humorless smile. "He would have had me examined by a team of scholars from Arabia to find out how I had become what I was and, more importantly, how one could duplicate the effect. But the Emperor wasn't in the city at that time, and the local bishop had other plans for me."

"What did the bishop have to do with it?"

"After hearing what had happened in the tent, and questioning the witnesses, he got it into his head that I was possessed by the devil." Reuben threw Burchard a meaningful look, and to Ayla's amusement the hairy steward turned red and looked away. Her amusement was brief though.

"What was it like? In the dungeon, I mean?"

Reuben's gaze was level as he met her eyes. "Do you remember I once told you I had to eat rats to survive?"

"Y-yes."

"That was in the dungeon under Palermo."

"Oh."

Ayla didn't know what to say or do. She wanted to rush forward, kiss him, hug him, comfort him in any way she could—but she didn't, for two reasons. Firstly, because hugging him as tightly as she wanted to would surely reopen the wounds on his back. Secondly, because Burchard had only jus stopped demanding Reuben's immediate execution, and she wasn't about to kiss Reuben in front of him. That would be a sure way to renew the demands for execution. Maybe her father's old friend would even demand a few more tortures before he saw to it that Reuben was burned alive.

"It was cold and damp," Reuben continued. "There were a lot of rats, but I ought not to complain about them. They were the only thing I ever got to eat. Someone had bandaged my wounds, but no one ever came to check if they festered. There weren't any other prisoners in the cell with me. They probably thought I'd instruct them in my satanic ways. The Bishop let me stew down there for a while. Why exactly, I don't know. To give me time to contemplate my soul, maybe? I certainly did some thinking, and realized how hollow the things were I had built my life on. Honor, knighthood, faith..."

He spat on the ground. When he saw Ayla's stare, he quickly extended a foot and wiped the spittle away with the heel of his boot.

"All I wanted was out," he told her, and the iron determination in his voice left her feeling sorry for the ones who might have been standing in his way. "Out of that cell. Out of Palermo. Out of my life as it had been. I tried to brake the dungeon door, but after three days of beating my knuckles bloody, I gave up. I shouted for someone to let me out, but I might as well have shouted at the sea to not be wet. They came for me, in the end, and it was clear what they wanted."

"Torture." The whispered word out of Ayla's mouth wasn't a question. She knew all too well what happened to people suspected of witchcraft and devil worship.

Reuben nodded, silently.

"Really? Why don't you have a foot or an arm missing, then? Why aren't your fingers crushed to pulp, and your arms covered with scars?" Burchard wanted to know. "From what I've heard, churchmen aren't squeamish when they're questioning a suspected warlock or witch."

"They aren't, as a general rule. But they are, when that suspected warlock has dined with the Emperor, who happens not to be all that fond of witch trials. I overheard the bishop talking to one of his underlings about it. 'Don't mangle him,' he said. 'Get a confession out of him, but I want him to stay presentable, just in case the Emperor comes back earlier than expected.' So they went for my armpits, my toes, the soles of my feet—anything that isn't clearly visible with clothes on."