A/N: Now this one is really short, but I guess we all want to get out of these dungeons as fast as possible, so this will be the next-to-last one in the cell, promise. They are far too depressing and oppressive.

Chapter 5

Gwaine hadn't said a word for days. It was the most significant sign that the situation was serious. Seeing the knight sitting across from me, leaning against the bars of the door and staring dead ahead was the most horrible thing I had seen so far.

The attacking Southrons were terrifying, but Gwaine, who would normally joke in the most horrid circumstances, as quiet as this made it hard for me to believe in a rescue.

He himself had told me Arthur would come back. He was so certain of it then. But Gaius' sudden appearance and his obvious illness seemed to have shaken even his faith.

The physician's condition had not changed. Three more days had gone by in which he had only moved very little, hadn't said anything and had only drunken what I was able to pour down his throat. Most of the time he continued to just stare at the ceiling.

In the beginning, before he himself stopped talking, Gwaine had tried to speak with Gaius, but without avail, and after a while he had simply stopped.

The minutes crawled by unbelievably slowly.

I sat beneath the small, barred window, desperately trying not to think of the outside. But the more I tried, the more I yearned for the warm summer sun and wind on my face.

Sometimes I nodded off, just to wake to the faintest noise and then I would be overcome by the realization where I was, feeling ever more hopeless.

I felt like I needed to cry, but I couldn't. There were no tears left, even though I had shed none, because of the lack of water in my system.

The guards would come by at irregular times to laugh and gloat at us. Sometimes they would come and eat their lunch in front of the cell, throwing the uneatable remains at us to see if we were broken yet and would try to eat them. They thought it hilarious, of course.

They gave us water, at Morgana's command, but only barely enough to keep us from dying of thirst.

Morgana herself came by once every day, walking from cell to cell, always stopping longest at ours.

She knew exactly which words would hurt the most.

When she came by the first day, shortly after Gwaine had returned from his fight, she told us that now she knew where Arthur and Merlin were headed and that she would get them, for sure. Neither one of us said anything to this, but when I looked at Gaius, I could see that he was crying.

On the second day she talked about the knights she had executed for not swearing their allegiance to her, not telling us names, but giving Gwaine a significant, small, unbelievably cruel smile. This was the only time the knight did say something, very quietly, but there were no feelings conveyed in his voice and the threat was empty: "Go to hell, Morgana."

For a second, Morgana looked shaken, but then she just smiled once more and left without another word.

On the third day, she ponderedif by now Agravaine had captured the king and how long it would take them to return to Camelot.

When Morgana came by on the evening of the sixth day of our imprisonment, she took a weak and stumbling Gwaine with her. I had an excruciatingly strong feeling I could not shake that this time he would not get back.

When the steps of the guards had fainted in the distance, I felt even more alone than before, wishing I had gone back to my own world while I still had the chance. I would get pulled back there when I died from lack of food, but this would take a lot more time yet.

You don't starve as easily as people in movies want you to believe. A body clings to life as long as it is possible, even when there is only the slightest bit of hope. But with every second that I was imprisoned, my hope got smaller.

The guards returned, faster than ever before. From the moment I heard their steps, I knew something was wrong. The door was opened, and Gwaine was flunginside, landing face-down just beside me. I turned him around carefully, when I noticed that he got not up on his own, and gasped at what I saw: The whole front of his shirt was drained in blood and the knight's face was ashen-pale, his breathing shallow and strained.

I almost passed out there and then.

Yes, I had seen blood before and I had tended wounds, even bad ones, but I had never been alone and always had the right instruments. But in this cell, I was absolutely helpless.

While I stared at the knight like I was petrified, not able to look away or do something, anything, to help him, I heard someone move. In the next moment, Gaius knelt down beside me. To this day I have no idea how he managed to gather enough strength to shake off the grip of the Nathair on him, but the physician did it.

His fingers shaking badly, he laid one hand on my shoulder and said with a surprisingly steady, though hoarse voice: "If you think you can handle this, stay here. I could use your help. If you don't, you'd better get out of my way."