closed | nessum prison blues

[cozen]

WHO: Bastien, Byerly, Talin, Tav, Teren, and Vlast
WHAT: Prison break
WHEN: Mid-Harvestmere (October) 9:50
WHERE: Southern Tevinter. Not actually Nessum–the post title is a joke—but somewhere in the wilderness not too far from there.
NOTES: OOC post. General violence cw.

The trap is not immediately apparent. They're met by a man dressed as their contact, Georgios, was meant to be dressed. Maybe the clothes are a little too big on him—but the People of the Silent Plains have bigger things to worry about than careful tailoring. Maybe his manner is a little wary and skittish, but he's a freedom fighter on the outskirts of a war zone meeting a group of strangers, some of them wholly alien, to escort to the People's hiding place.

And maybe the plan was meant to go better than this. Maybe the Vints waiting at the end of the road with their grenades and telekinetic prison spells planned to mount a more organized attack, neat and swift, once everyone had been lured into long-parched desert ravine ahead.

But something gives it away first. "Georgios" grows a little too anxious on the approach; the wind catching his jacket and lifting it enough to show a flash of a bloodstain on the back of his shirt that's too dark and too maroon not to be from earlier this same day. A glimpse, if nothing else, of one of the people lying in wait ahead of them, something in their posture that twigs as too tense, not quite right for a lookout protecting a hide-out and only seeing an expected group of visitors on the approach. Regardless of what tips various members of the group off, it's enough forewarning for them refuse to be led quietly into the corral that's been set up for them.

Half a chase, half a fight. The grenades and dirty magic tricks still come out. So do more drastic measures: arrows, fire, the blunt sides of heavy swords. Threats to cut the throats of whomever's been caught first if whomever's still fighting doesn't lay down their weapon. One way or another, in the end, everyone's wrangled into a wagon, hands bound and heads covered with sacks to obscure their view of where they're being taken. No gags, though. There's no one out here to hear them.

Comments

[bouchonne]

Of all the prisoners, Byerly probably does seem like the one who'd be most likely to break under torture. Teren is tough as nails, after all; Qunari are Qunari; elves can famously endure; and Bastien is a commoner. Byerly, on the other hand, is thin and foppish and clearly highborn, and therefore seems much more fragile.

And to their captors, it does seem to be the case. The moment he's in the interrogation room, he babbles like a fool. Any threat or hint of injury brings forth a new flood of words, accompanied by trembling and by tears. "Don't hurt me, please," Byerly begs, every time, just before sharing a strategic mixture of verifiable truths and unverifiable lies. He's telling them things that they already know, and telling them next to nothing that they don't.

The spymaster who trained him was many things, but he was not a fool. And he did not train a fool.

His apparent compliance has gotten him rewards from their captors. This time, as he's returned blubbering to the cell, he has an apple in his hands. The cell door is locked; then the guard retreats, and Byerly's tears dry up.

"Here," he says softly, holding the apple to his cellmate. "Take it."

[tadpoled]

Tav hates seeing anyone struggle like this. Watching Byerly upset makes Tav's own heart ache. There's no judgment from Tav when he returns and shakes his head at the offer of the apple.

"You take it," Tav replies. "I won't need it for a while longer."

Not that elves can go without food indefinitely, but Tav has ventured through the wilds and not starved. That said, nearly all of Tav's multitudes of freckles are now hidden by bruising. Not his first rodeo with torture and not his first rodeo with holding firm.

"We'll get out of here," Tav attempts to reassure.

[bouchonne]

"One way or another." Byerly's smile is edged and cynical. "Maybe walking out, and maybe carried out."

If Tav isn't going to take the apple, Byerly certainly isn't going to force him. He takes it and starts eating it — slowly, making it last, avoiding making contact with the burn that's been seared into his palm by the torturer. Even apparent compliance hasn't spared him all pain.

"Only time will tell."

[cozen]

From beyond the bars on Byerly's other side, Bastien says, "Walking."

He says it under his breath. He has his chin tipped down. His eyes have been closed, until now, aside from a sleepy, miserable but unconcerned glance up when Byerly was escorted back in. Whenever they're looking—the guards, especially Viator—he's taken care not to look more concerned about Byerly than about any of the others. No need to hand them another weapon.

But the sweet smell of an apple blooming through the stale, dusty air is a good excuse for perking up and looking closer at what's going on in the adjacent cell, so he does. He also slides his hand through the bars and holds it out expectantly.

[bouchonne]

"The optimist tempts fate with his incautious words," Byerly replies. Likewise, he's done his best to seem utterly indifferent to what happens to Bastien, even as he craves nothing more than reaching his hand out to the neighboring cell so that he might hold his beloved's hand.

He takes a lingering bite of the apple, pressing his lips to its skin, imagining how Bastien's lips will touch the same spot. And that brings some small comfort to him.

Byerly is, horribly, a grotesque romantic. Thank the Maker he largely keeps it to himself.

The apple is handed over. "Don't take too much of it."

[doneisdone]

Though she doesn't move a muscle, Teren's silent vigil is interrupted by the brief flicker of her gaze toward the apple, and those passing it around.
When Byerly hands it back, she looks forward again, unmoving.

[cozen]

"Don't take too much of it," Bastien echoes in a mocking mumble. Their current guard might take away from that the idea that he doesn't care for Byerly, because she's busy shining her boots—or someone's boots, anyway—and doesn't look up to catch the flicker of affection on his face as he says it.

Unfortunately, he doesn't have eyes in the back of his head anymore than the guard has eyes in the top of hers. He misses Teren's glance while he's looking at Byerly, putting the apple to his mouth, scraping his teeth along the edges of the bite Byerly already took, leaving one bigger bite instead of a second new bite in his wake, and coming away with paper-thin shreds of fruit in his mouth.

He holds them there, sweet on his tongue. He glances over at Teren, but in the face of stoniness, it's By he tries to hand the apple off to.

"D'accord. The worst pain you have ever felt and lived to tell about," he says, in much the same tone he'd prompt everyone to share their first kiss or their favorite season. Only a little more tired. And slightly garbled by the apple he's still holding in his mouth, unchewed. "Tav?"

[tadpoled]

Tav glances down at the burn on Byerly's hand, wishing he had access to his healing magic, or even just some bandages from his pack, right about now. Looking to the others, he wishes there was some way to help them, even if just to lift their spirits.

"Probably having my eye plucked out," Tav sighs, tapping his cheek under his milky-white left eye. "Got it put back, but can't see out of it any more."

Gale had most definitely not been pleased with Tav's offer to volunteer for such an experiment.

[bouchonne]

“Got it back?” Byerly’s eyes narrow as he takes in Tav’s face anew. “You didn’t want to - say - get a glass one instead?” And wouldn’t this one be rotting? Horrifying.

By takes back the apple from Bastien. There’s something very sentimental in the way he then cradles it to his chest. These two are disgustingly in love, truly.

[tadpoled]

“Hag magic,” Tav replies with a groan. “Never make a deal with hag.”

Tav considers the question regarding a glass eye and shrugs.

“It all happened really fast and I was blinded by the pain.” Tav explains. “I would have to get it removed again to put in a glass eye.”

[doneisdone]

A cryptic bark of laughter rings out from where Teren sits, and then she falls silent again.

[cozen]

Bastien's eyebrows go up at Tav's response—and up, and up. He gives Byerly an is he for real sort of look, half because it's an excuse to look Byerly in the face for a moment without it being a fretful, yearning thing, and half because is he for real. But of course he is for real. This isn't even the weirdest story Bastien's heard him tell.

His head swivels around to Teren when she laughs, curious, and he keeps looking at her while he says, "Shouldn't have led with you, huh?"

With a rifter, he means, and in another situation maybe he would say it with some real teeth. Being impressed by rifters' odd and wondrous lives all the time can get a little exhausting. But he doesn't want to give away what Tav and Vlast are. That might warrant a hastier response from the Venatori than the mere presence of anchors.

"Your turn," he says to Teren.

Odds seem even she'll refuse, but worth a shot.

[dirthsal]

Before Teren can speak up, Talin has a question—though he's not jumping his place in line, merely establishing rules:

"Is this only physical pain, or emotional as well?"

[doneisdone]

Teren opens her mouth, takes a breath, and closes it again when Talin interjects. If she's offended by the interruption, it doesn't show on her face, which is tired and wry as before.

[tadpoled]

Tav shrugs at the response to his story. In the short few months he could remember from Faerun, all sorts of things had happened to him. Nevermind the whole Urge that had now seemingly been defeated.

At Talin's question, Tav provides, "Pain is pain is pain. I don't see why we need to restrict to one or the other."

[allthatgleamsisgold]

Chains clink as Vlast stirs in his corner. He'd fallen into a fitful doze for the last hour, but the sound of voices drew him back to the waking world.

"Why dwell on pain here? Aren't we just playing further into their hands?"