Chapter Ten: She Is Just A Girl
The next morning, Tristan was back, dragging Avilon out of dreams by her hair. She was towed out of the cell and into the corridor, yelling at Tristan.
'Bastard, let go! Bastard!'
He threw her down, and she collapsed against the wall. Galahad was behind Tristan, eyeing Avilon with disgust and anger.
'Get up!' Tristan hissed. 'Now!' Avilon glared at him and pushed herself up, using the wall for support.
'I'm unarmed!' she shouted. 'You don't have to use such violence!' Avilon spat at him again, and earned a backhanded slap across the face. Tristan took Avilon's upper arm in a vice-like grip and stormed down the corridor, half-dragging her, followed closely by Galahad. He pushed her through a doorway, into an almost completely bare room.
The walls were white, plain. Light bled into the room through an east-facing window with no glass. In one corner, a hook on a chain was hanging from the ceiling. Avilon knew that if she were to stretch her arms up, she would only just be able to just reach the hook. In the centre of the plain room, a roman-style, backless chair stood; it was starkly cheery against the woeful surroundings, with a bright red seat and curved, beech wood legs.
As she was thrown into the chair by Tristan's strong arms, Avilon looked around again to see two knights standing in the far corner.
'Ah, Lancelot. How lovely it is to see you again,' Avilon smirked. 'Oh, and our brave general. Really Artorius, I am graced with your presence.' Tristan backhanded her again for insolence.
'Tristan.' Arthur warned him. Tristan stepped back from the cowering girl, his face – as ever – emotionless.
'You really aren't very creative with your methods, are you, Tristan?' Avilon questioned. A wolfish smiled played around the scout's lips.
'Oh, I don't want to scare you to death... yet.' He noticed, with appreciation, a small glimmer of fear in the girl's eyes. Then it was gone.
'You only need answer our questions, or I will let Tristan...' he search for a word other than 'torture.'
'Interrogate?' Avilon supplied helpfully, smiling. Arthur frowned at her.
'What's your name?' he demanded.
'Avilon,' she replied, disdain dripping from her voice.
'You already told us that wasn't your name.' Lancelot said quietly.
'Maybe I lied,' Avilon said matter-of-factly. Tristan smacked her again. 'Would you desist?' she yelled at him, spitting blood onto the floor and wiping it from her bottom lip.
The pain barely registered in her mind. She had had worse. Much worse. More than anything these knights could do to her.
'Bastard,' she swore at him.
'I will enjoy this. The longer you persist with your silence, the more fun I will have.' The scout's eyes glittered with unveiled menace.
'Well then, Sir Tristan. Whatever would happen if you were to be deprived of your amusement?'
'Who sent you, Avilon?' Arthur asked.
'No-one! I've told you. I came for me, not for someone else!'
'So why are you here?' Arthur persisted.
'To kill you, my lord,' Avilon replied, as if it was blindingly obvious.
'Are you truly willing to die protecting a man who forced you to kill?' Lancelot asked, his voice almost gentle.
'Look, you arrogant fool. No-one ordered me here! Why would I lie? Surely if someone had forced me, I would be giving up their name in an instant?' Lancelot looked pained at her insult, but could see the sense in what she said.
'Fine.' Arthur stepped back from the girl's slender body, shaking his head. 'Tristan, she's yours.'
Lancelot followed him from the room, leaving the door wide open. Tristan looked down at the dark-haired girl seated before him. It was silent, Galahad's heavy breathing the only noise in the room. Tristan stared and stared at Avilon, until finally she looked up. And there it was again, a flicker of fear in her eyes. She was frightened.
Finally, thought Tristan.
He bent down and wound his hands into her hair. Her scalp burned, but Avilon let no pain contort her features. She looked up into Tristan's eyes and smiled grimly. So be it,Tristan thought. He slapped her twice around the face, not holding back at all. Avilon gasped as she was thrown from the seat. She crawled away from Tristan, clutching at her head. Tristan grabbed the back of her shirt and hauled her upright. He glared at the girl, then swiftly dropped her again as her teeth sunk into his forearm.
His face remained impassive as he kicked her in the stomach; Avilon cried out in pain. Tristan heaved her back into the chair, where she sat looking straight ahead. Tristan looked into her eyes: the flame of defiance that had burned so bright earlier was gone. The girl stared up at him with a vacant, blank look in her eyes.
'I can do this for weeks, woman. But neither of us are getting any younger. Talk.' Avilon looked away, down at the floor; blood dripped from her lip onto the pale stones.
'Do what you want,' she said bleakly. 'I really don't care.' Tristan licked his top lip and shook his head. He let go of the girl's hair and stepped away from her.
'Galahad, take her back to the cell.'
'What? She hasn't said anything! You can't have finished!' Galahad spluttered in protestation.
'Look, she's gone dead.' Tristan snapped his fingers in front of the girl's face to prove his point. Avilon didn't even blink. 'She wont talk now. We can try again tomorrow. She's obviously faced torture before.'
Galahad took Avilon back to her cell and dumped her in one corner. As he left, closing the door surprisingly quietly behind him, he heard the girl gasping for breath. He shook his head and walked back towards the fortress hall, followed by the girl's echoing sobs.
The fortress hall was square, with a door set in the centre of each wall. Roman-style statues of ancient Gods and Goddesses watched over all who entered the room. The large, round table was of polished mahogany, with carved wooden chairs tucked beneath. A fire, the main light source of the room, was encaged in a briar at its centre. Spaced evenly along the walls were torches held in brackets; they gave out wide circles of orange light, casting dark blue-black shadows onto the walls and floor. The room, however fervently lit, was still dim; the faces of the knights sat around the circular table were shadowed and sallow in the muted light. The room, like many others in the building, had no windows, and therefore had to be lit by fire.
Lancelot was staring so deeply into the flames of the briar he could almost see past the flickering tongues of orange, and straight into Bors' face; the larger knight sighed and cast a long glance towards Tristan.
'Devices working?' he asked bitterly.
'No,' Tristan shook his head. 'She wont say a word.'
'Look, isn't there some other way?' Galahad looked round at his fellow knights, searching for any signs of pity. 'She's barely a girl.'
'She's not a girl, Galahad,' Gawain growled, his eyes bright. 'She's an assassin, one who murdered my brother and nearly killed Arthur. She's no girl!' he continued, as Galahad looked affronted. 'I say we just kill her and avenge Gareth!'
'No,' Arthur shouted over the rising argument. 'We will not kill her. She could be valuable. If these attacks are aimed at Roman generals in particular, it could mean chaos all over Britain and Rome. She has to talk.' He stood up. 'I'm as hesitant as you, Galahad, but we can't let this slide. Tristan, visit her again tomorrow. Dagonet, take Gawain and see what you can do about her wounds.' Dagonet nodded and swiftly stood, beckoning to Gawain; the younger knight stood, blonde-brown dreadlocks pouring down his back, and followed the healer from the hall.
'Where are we going?' asked Gawain, slightly confused as Dagonet turned towards the kitchens.
'Everyone needs to eat, Gawain,' Dagonet explained in his gentle, quiet voice. 'Even assassins.' Gawain shook his head, but followed his friend to the kitchens. Dagonet filled a pitcher with water from the trough while Gawain bundled a loaf of bread up in a warm cloth, and then he followed Dagonet out and towards the holding cells.
'So you believe she's an assassin?' he asked Dagonet as they walked in a companionable silence. Dagonet looked down at the top of Gawain's head, almost foot below his own.
'Do you?' he countered. Gawain was suddenly very interested in the floor, and the walls: anything that wasn't his blood brother's teasing, yet slightly accusatory face.
'I don't know...' Gawain muttered. 'When I saw Gareth,' he gulped, 'dead, I wanted to kill her. But now... Galahad is right - she's just a girl, Dag.' He whispered the last few words, trying to make sense of his feelings.
'Aye,' nodded Dagonet. 'I understand, lad.' They descended the stone steps into the holding cells; the temperature dropped sharply and the steady drip, drip of water resounded from the high ceiling.
Gawain unlocked holding cell five – the only occupied one – and held the door for Dagonet.
Dagonet nearly dropped the pitcher when he saw Avilon's face. Her skin was pale and yellow, but flushed on her cheeks. The girl's eyelids and sockets were stained a deep purple, and there was bruising evident over her whole face. Desiccated blood around her chin and lips stood out from the sallow skin, and more red had spread in a blossoming flower over her once-blue tunic. Avilon croaked wretchedly as the knights entered her cell, trying to open her eyes.
Dagonet knelt beside her, lifting her head and helping her upright. He cupped water in his hands and cleaned the blood from her chin. The watered-down liquid dripped onto her tunic, staining it ever further from its original colour. Avilon coughed as Dagonet held the pitcher to her lips, trying feebly to push him away.
'You need to drink. You're dehydrated, and that could speed up the infections in your cuts. If you don't do as I say, you may die.'
Avilon mumbled something that sounded awfully like 'so what,' but drank more water from the pitcher.
'Gawain, I need the cloth,' Dagonet demanded, fully initiated into his role as healer. Gawain unwrapped the bread and handed the cloth to his friend, glancing worriedly at the girl who had slumped forwards, leaning her head on Dagonet's arm. Dipping the cloth in the pitcher, Dagonet carefully lifted up the girl's head and cleaned the rest of the blood from her chin and from the lacerations by her right eye.
His patient was still having trouble opening her eyes, so Dagonet tore of a hunk of bread and put it into her hands. The girl, obviously starving, crammed the bread into her mouth, caring little about appearances. She winced as she chewed on the good-quality starch product, her jawbone scraping against her skull painfully. As she ate, tears overflowed from her eyes and dripped down her bruised cheeks.
'What has the scout done to you?' Dagonet asked her, shaking his head. That man goes too far, the normally gentle knight thought angrily. `He's cracked two of her ribs! No girl should go through this... Dagonet decided to not let Tristan anywhere near the girl until she had properly healed, and even then he would protect her from the worst of Tristan's beatings.
'I have to remove your shirt, to see your ribs properly,' he explained to the girl. The girl looked afraid and crossed her arms over her chest protectively. 'I will not hurt you,' Dagonet said firmly, tugging lightly on her shirt. The girl finally uncrossed her arms, wincing again at the stabbing pain in her ribs. Dagonet pulled the shirt over her head, and was relieved to see she was wearing a breast-band that covered her upper chest. He turned his gaze to her abdomen and his eyes widened in shock. Fierce burns, red and puckered, spread across her stomach and disappeared under her breast-band. A yellowing bruise, purple at the edges, had blossomed down one side of her ribcage, and several open cuts where visible just below, where the skin had burst from pressure.
'I shall kill him!' growled Gawain from behind Dagonet. Avilon yelped in horror as she realised someone else was there and feebly tried to cover her body up. Gawain looked furious at the extent of Avilon's wounds, but his cheeks flushed as he realised just how naked the girl was. He turned around swiftly, breathing heavily. 'I apologise, sorry...' he said pathetically. Dagonet snorted quietly and turned back to the girl, whose cheeks were an even heavier shade of red now.
'You need to turn over; I need to see your back, just to check for more injuries,' he spoke softly, as if calming a startled horse. The girl's eyes widened and her nostrils flared. She used her last resources of strength to push herself away from the large knight, scared as a rabbit staring into the wolf's open mouth.
'Please,' she half-whispered, half-croaked, dry lips cracking. 'Don't.' Dagonet looked slightly bemused, but grasped the girl's thin wrists with a firm hand.
'I have to see the extent of your injuries. If your ribs are broken you will be in lots of trouble. I haveto see your back,' he elaborated, trying to impress upon her the necessity of his knowing her injuries. Avilon stared up at him with glazed eyes, terrified of something unknown to the knight.
Then she tore her gaze away from his blue eyes and nodded almost imperceptibly. She shifted her body and, with the help of his strong arms, turned her back on the two knights.
Even Dagonet couldn't stifle his gasp; Avilon hung her head in shame. Recovering from his momentary lapse in decorum, Dagonet leant forwards and inspected the girl's back closely.
Pink, puckered scars crossed the girl's back, cutting the flesh into white diamonds. They were easily discernible as whip marks.
'Did Tristan – ?' Gawain gasped.
'No,' Dagonet said definitely. 'These are scars, Gawain, not cuts. Some are years old.' He turned his attention to the shivering girl. 'Who did this to you, child? Who tortured you in such a way?' Avilon clenched her jaw, stubborn to the end.
Dagonet stood up from her shaking form, and stalked out of the cell, calling over his shoulder, 'I have to tell Arthur. We have to get her out of here or she'll be dead by tomorrow.'