Maugrim dragged Jack down several flights of stairs until they reached the dungeons. A dwarf met them there and removed Jack's shackles, and then chained him to the cell wall with his hands in front of him.
"Since he don't eat, we won't be needing to see him again anytime soon," the dwarf cackled as he shut the iron bars to Jack's cell. The noise hurt Jack's head, so he only slumped further. Never had he wished more fervently for sleep. But sleep did not come.
Sleep did not come for the next century, as it had not come for the last. Jack had gotten used to not sleeping, but the queen's dungeon was a lonely place. Lacking company, he longed for the oblivion of sleep. Sometimes he would wonder if he actually knew what it felt like to sleep, or if he was just imagining how it felt from seeing so many people over the years do it. He supposed it was a natural function, though, so it was ingrained in him, even if he could not remember it.
Periods of true lucidity, however, were difficult to come by. The ache in his chest that had started when the queen stole his staff did not abate. It was easier to deal with if he allowed himself to fall into a dazed trance, not fully aware of his surroundings or even himself; a kind of limbo where pain, physical or otherwise, felt distant and as cold as the frost he was named for. There were exactly two things that could pull him out of this state, and they were few and far between.
The presence of another prisoner or a guard always drew his attention. No one ever visited Jack – not needing food, there was no need for anyone to enter his cell, especially – and how he hated to even think of it – since he suspected only the queen and a handful of her closest minions could see him. However, the queen had a number of enemies (rather more than Jack might have expected a rightful monarch to have) and sometimes she liked to have them imprisoned before she turned them to stone. They required food, water, blankets, and guards to tend to them. Jack noticed without curiosity that he was not guarded. Not physically anyway; if Jack had more of a magical sense he might have noticed the imprisonment spells surrounding his cell.
The other happening that woke Jack was when the queen used his staff to generate some particularly strong spell. Through this he discovered that he was linked more closely to his staff than he had thought. He could feel when the queen was using his staff, and whenever she called heavily on its power, he would jerk into full wakefulness, curled protectively around his stomach as if that could help him.
It was through this deep connection that Jack came to realize that the long winter the queen had told him was a natural season was artificial. He could feel her combating springtime with powerful blizzards and wickedly cold winds; he could feel it, but had no way of stopping it. That was another reason he tried to stay away from full wakefulness. The more he thought, the more he realized he was trapped, helpless, powerless, useless, nothing. He was nothing more than a convenient source of power. He hated that, and hating that became too much like hating himself, and that hurt.
Jack spent a hundred years that way, dimly aware of the queen using his stolen magic so that her domain would be forever trapped in winter. The moonlight could not reach his cell, so even that companionship – or scapegoat – was lost. Jack was in a dark place when the first hints of change came.
It was such a small thing at first, just the slightest relief of his pain. Jack was unaware that he leaned against the wall with less tension than before, or that he sighed as he did it. He remained unaware for probably about a day, when he stretched out to lie on the ground and his breath came uninhibited. He sat bolt upright, one hand grabbing the front of his shirt and then pressing fingertips into his chest gingerly, seeking out residual pain. There was none.
He jumped to his feet, ready to rush to the bars of his cell and shout for the witch to come face him if she dared, but the chains that bound him to the back wall had not weakened over the years. Jack's head cracked against the floor as he stumbled and could not get his hands behind him in time. He lay still for long minutes, inhaling deeply and cursing everything he could think of under his breath. Then he stood again, cautiously, and got as close as he could to the door.
"Hey!" he yelled. Or, rather, tried to yell. His voice was scratchy and barely loud enough for his own ears. He coughed to clear his throat and yelled again.
"Hey! Anyone out there?"
Unfortunately, his hails went unanswered. He tried again sporadically, thinking to catch someone off guard and elicit some sort of surprised gasp, at the least, but it seemed that no one was guarding his wing of the dungeons. He went back to his wall and slumped against it, staring moodily at his hands.