Two chapters in as many days! I'm desperate to get to a certain point before I go on holiday for three weeks at the end of this month. I don't think I'd be forgiven if I left you all in the lurch! Thank you to all who read and to those who leave comments. Apologies, as always, if any little errors have sneaked past me!

Time passes and how is Athos after his devastating realisation?

CHAPTER 42

GERVAIS

"Why doesn't he wake up? Guillaume asks. "He has been asleep for far too long."

Before I can answer, Guy huffs and I know immediately that whatever spurious comment is about to leave his mouth, it will be of the unhelpful kind.

"Are you sure he's still alive? If he had any sense, he'd be dead by now."

"If you cannot say anything positive, keep quiet and try using some common sense," I order. "If he were dead, he'd have been with us by now."

"Not necessarily," Guy counters, and I can hear in his voice that he is put out by what I said to him and therefore he is of a mind to contradict everything that Guillaume and I say from here on.

"I don't recall anything about my actual dying or what happened straight afterwards." It is the first time Guillaume has claimed any such thing and he sounds morose, but I know it stems from his mounting concern for the young Musketeer.

"That's it, be cheerful!" Guy scolds, but I ignore him. The soldier has not said anything to us for a very long time and certainly not to berate Guy.

"You're a fine one to talk!" Guillaume snaps back and I know I must intervene to prevent a full-scale row developing between the two.

"How long since his friends failed to find him?" I ask softly. I am not sure if the Musketeer is asleep or if he can hear us, and I am fearful of saying anything that might re-awaken the surge of grief we witnessed when he realised that he was not about to be rescued.

"How should I know?" Guy sounds belligerent now as each of us begins to think of events that caused us to be cast down here and our own miserable endings. This poor individual who has joined us reminds us of our past mortality and all that we have lost. It is a sobering thought.

He has slept much of the time and in those periods of wakefulness, he has sat with his back against the wall, knees drawn up, head bowed and unmoving. No more attempts at any form of exercise; no more trying to climb out; no interaction with his gaolers. The only way they know that he lives is that he still takes the sack and retrieves the food and water, but he no longer entirely consumes either. Remnants of the bread are scattered about the pit floor, now undigestible and as hard as the stones and rock fragments that have been here since the pit was originally hollowed out. He has taken sips from the water bag but, all too often, it is returned unemptied.

"Time has ceased to be." Guillaume is obviously in a reflective mood. "We are dead. There is no need for the day to be divided into the segments that were so important to us in life. What is day? What is night when we exist in eternity?" He pauses and then blurts out. "Is this purgatory, do you think?

That's a typical response from him, raised as he was to be a devout advocate of the church of Rome and a feasible explanation to him as to why he hasn't ascended to anything resembling a heavenly state.

"Of course it's not." Guy is not being very supportive at all. "This is Hell. We were sent here for our misdeeds and will stay here in the cold, damp and dark, forgotten about and only the three of us for company. No," he quickly corrects himself. "Make that the four of us for company."

"His brothers may return. Something may draw them back here. Miracles do happen!" There's Guillaume, ever the optimist! "It falls to us to keep him alive."

"And how do you propose to do that?" Guy is scornful. "We can hardly force feed him. In case you've forgotten, we no longer have any functioning limbs and we cannot move. It's been a long time since we were even skin and bone." His laughter, bordering on the manic, echoes uncannily around the pit. "Now we're just the bone!"

"We do what we have been doing thus far," I intervene. "We talk to him, cajole him into eating what little bread there is and making sure he drinks all of the water that he is given. We cannot allow him to give up, not yet, or his captors will likewise give up on him, believing that he no longer lives so that they stop delivering that small lifeline."

"Who do you think you are to say who should live and who should die?" Guy is suddenly incandescent with rage. "If the man is past hope, let him die? Why prolong his agony? Allow him to fall asleep and to wake no more. This is not living by any definition of the word."

"Just because you gave up quickly, does not mean he has to do the same," Guillaume protests. "You had no faith to motivate you and he -"

"Has no faith either!" Guy interrupts. "Have you heard him say any prayers since he was put here?"

I listen to them both and admire Guillaume's persistence.

"You are bitter because you feel that God withdrew his love and deserted you in your hour of need."

"Of course he deserted me!" Guy is shrieking now. "That's a strange sort of divine love when an all-powerful God can allow one man to treat another man like this without any intervention!"

"You do not see His plan for you."

"Plan! What plan? What on earth are you talking about? Look around you. What plan is it that leaves us down here to die alone and rot until we are nothing but a pile of bones?"

"God still loves you …"

"Then he has a peculiar way of demonstrating that!"

Undeterred, Guillaume presses on. "I will pray for him, for I do not believe that he is destined to die down here," and he smiles. "I will pray for you too."

"I'm not asking you to pray for me, soldier-priest!"

He refers to the time when Guillaume was alive, a soldier commanding and training men for Bircann. He was concerned for the welfare of the men serving him, for their spiritual needs as well as the physical ones.

"But I will do so nonetheless. You are sore charged with fears of being forgotten and need some succour."

Before Guy can respond, flickering torchlight appears above us and the grill is opened. Soon, the sack is wending its way down towards us.

I move close to the Musketeer's ear and speak, willing him to hear me and rewarded when he stirs.

"Athos, the sack is descending. You must ready yourself to retrieve the food and water."

I can hear Guillaume intoning a prayer behind me although I cannot discern what he is actually saying, but Athos goes through the motion of feeling around for his current water bottle and he finds it. He seems in a daze as he catches the sack, pulls out the stale bread and the new water bottle, replacing it with the old one.

The guards call down to him and he does not reply, but they are satisfied that he is still breathing. All too soon, the grill is replaced and the light goes. He is plunged once more into utter darkness with only the three of us for company.

He has placed the items within reach to his right, but his hand falls limply by his side. That one small task has seemingly exhausted him, but I cannot let him rest.

"Athos, I know you can hear me. You are not to go to sleep until you have had something to eat and drink. We will not let you sleep; now is not the time. You must eat and drink."

And so I keep on, relentlessly, and Guillaume joins me, cajoling, encouraging, bribing and urging. We even use empty threats, but he is too weak to notice.

"Stir yourself, Musketeer. What good are you to the King and France if you disobey a direct order to eat and drink to conserve your strength?"

Surprised, I turn to Guy, and nod with appreciation at his bullying tactics. I do not care what methods we use as long as something works and Guy's ploy definitely works.

Feeling something like elation mixed with relief, I spy Athos' hand creeping out to the bread. He picks it up slowly and starts to nibble at it.

It is a small step, but it is a start.

God willing, and in answer to Guillaume's prayers, the Musketeer will not give in today.