The room was dark and drear. The stones on the wall oozed wetness and agony. The chains on the walls were an old rusty iron, and worn down by the many prisoners that have been kept there. The man that was in them now was not expected to live until the next sunrise. He was a condemned man. His crime was a minor one. At least it was minor in his mind. Those who put him there had broken all of his fingers and cut out his eyes along with his tongue. Effectively mute and blind, he could not see the state that his once fine red robes were in now. They were a muted brown, some from his dried blood, more of it from the bodily wastes that he was forced to wallow in. His once-luxurious black hair had streaks of gray. When he had entered this room a mere month ago his hair had still been completely black. His once ruddy skin had take on the pallor and texture of a corpse that had been buried for months. They had offered him a quick death, a painless one, if he would reject his beliefs and embrace the Baron before death. He did not work like that. He had heard others jump at the chance, only to be killed by the Baron. He had only two things left to him: his pride, and the knowledge of the rest of the cell’s activities.

He heard a scream echo throughout the chambers, and he knew that someone else had fallen to Baron Randolph Stormslayer. He was damned, triply. He was going to be killed by the Baron for betraying him in a horrible manner, his family already rejected him, and once he died he would not even have the salvation of the one god that would protect him from the unending hells that awaited him. He had pretended to be of the clergy of Britigit.

Britigit, the goddess of freedom, and of fire. Oh, it wasn’t for impersonating one of her clerics. If you were going to go that far, you might as well be a cleric. She would reject him because of his past. For a brief time he was a slave trader. He would raid villages in the Whitelands and Irelia, and take the prisoners and sell them to the orcs of the Gagnarian Empire. He had played the part to get close to a ranking member of the Stormslayer house and assassinate him. The man’s son was known to keep association with a cleric of her Fiery Temper. He did not even make it to the man’s home before the Greymen, the inhuman servitors of Baron Randolph, had found him. The unbending, cold, hard armor of the arcane monstrosities was the last thing he had ever seen.

They had torn out his eyes with their gauntleted fingers. He remembered thinking that the armor was warm, and it was a nice, yet simple touch, used to make someone being killed by the Greymen think that they were human. He knew better; no mere mortal human could tear down a stone wall to get into his hideout. They broke his fingers, and had sliced out his tongue with their large claymore swords, with surgical precision that a Chirurgeon would be hard pressed to match.

He should be honored, for a simple assassin to be interviewed by the Baron himself. Also to have the Baron’s elite sent to bring him in. He did not give the Baron the satisfaction of getting his information. The Baron had laughed, saying that he would break, eventually. The Baron did not seem impatient, or worried that there was a cell of assassins trying to kill him. The only thing he heard that sounded remotely civilized was the door shutting as the Baron locked him into the cell. Since then it has just been the animalistic screams of the other prisoners. He was not fed, nor given water. He did not think he could pick it up or hold it down even if he was given the amenities. He was still alive somehow. Probably the Baron’s magic; he didn’t know. He also knew that while his eyes and mouth had stopped bleeding, nothing had been done to his fingers to help their healing. Or they had healed, and he did not realize it. He could not feel them, except when he would roll over on them in one of the fits of sleep that would come upon him at odd intervals.

He could tell the time since there was a small window that looked out into a courtyard was the other prisoners were exercised. He could feel the warmth of the sun on his face, but when it rained, the widow caused all the runoff of the prison yard to drain into his small cell. The cell would not flood, but water would gather on the floor. There was not enough to drown yourself in, but it would only dry up in time for the next rain. That was one of the reasons that the hole was still moist. There were others, he briefly thought that the cisterns of the castle drained into his cell, but he had no proof. He had no way to find out, being eyeless, and left without enough feeling in his fingers to probe for it.

He spent more and more time inside of his own skull, thinking back to the smells of his childhood, the sights beginning to fade due to the loss of his eyes. There was the smell of roast game bird, and the forests of Ganlay. There was the smell of the first whore he had lain with. That was one that came unbidden to memory far too often, the sweet smell of promised sex mixed with sweat and perfume. This was a most unwelcome memory. There was nothing he could do about it. He was nowhere near the whorehouse he had lain in, and was without fingers to do anything about it. He thought that might have been the Baron’s intent. Bring about fond memories, to make him yearn for the sweet escape of death, and the despair of knowing he would never leave with his freedom.

He was beginning to doubt his sanity. It would not be the first time, as he doubted his sanity frequently. He knew where the walls were, and the shackles, which the Baron did not even bother to use on him. He knew where the window and the door were. He had once thought of trying to get to freedom, an utterly useless thought in this pit of despair. When he tried to sleep he could swear that there were cockroaches and rats crawling over him, but he never felt them at any other time. He did not even hear the telltale signs of his verminous companions when awake.

He was not a good man and realized that he deserved every punishment the Baron inflicted on him. Such were the nature of his sins. Nor was he evil; he did not raise the dead. He killed, for money; that was his job. He was good at it; at least, he had thought that before he had come to work in Ghantra, the city of platforms on the lake. Completely surrounded by water on all edges, he thought that an escape from the city would be easy. He had a magic ring that would allow him to sail over the sides of Ghantra City and float down to the water as gently as a leaf falls from a tree. He never had a chance to use it.

He thought that what he was doing was the right thing. He was working his way up. His entire cell was hired by someone to kill the Baron. None had succeeded. He was the last to go after his target, and the only one not to die when trying. The Baron did not know that, though. For all the Baron knew, there was an entire guild of assassins out for his blood.

He would not give the Baron the satisfaction of breaking him. He would stay mute. Oddly funny, he had to stay mute; they had cut out his tongue. From what he had heard of the Baron, that did not cause much of a problem. He was not tortured, nor was he given any visitors. Not even the priests of Plon that he heard giving last rights to the dead.

About once a week the Baron would stoop down and come to him, asking him if he would like a clean death, or if he would prefer to rot in the cell. He never responded. Stormslayer would laugh and walk out with the words "You’ll break, eventually. They all do. It is just a matter of time, which is some we both have a great deal of, isn’t it?"

He hated the Baron. It seemed as if everyone in Ghantra did as well. He was just a thug, and not even a well-paid thug. If he had succeeded in killing his mark, the Baron’s own brother, he would have been made an assassin. He failed, he would not be rescued, and he was not worthy. If any of the other assassins had even thought of him, they would kill him to prevent him from betraying them. He knew that, but he stayed silent anyway.

It was a stupid code. A criminal’s code. Not enforceable, nor binding. He could talk if he wanted to. No one in the criminal underground would blame him. They understood the risks. Besides, if he talked, he would be dead any way, so any thoughts of vengeance would have to wait for the members of the underground to see him in hell.

The sweet smell of ale came to him. He wanted to raise a tankard and forget his problems. There was no ale, nor probably any smell. It was all in his head. Some times he thought he heard the assassin that offered him a position for killing the Baron’s brother. All imagined. Yet again, he doubted his sanity. He wondered if he could remember how to talk. He was already forgetting what things looked like. That often happened when someone lost his sight; he briefly wondered if that happened when you lost your tongue. Forgetting how to talk.

Oh, he could make sounds. Groans of pain in the night, and grunts of denial to the Baron. That was not the same, and he knew it. A thought flashed through his head. If he stayed here long enough, he would become an animal. Nothing more then an animal, the Baron would kill him for outliving his usefulness. He could win! That was it. He would just keep up what he was doing! Sooner or later the Baron would kill him anyway. What was it the Baron had said? "It is just a matter of time, which is some we both have a great deal of, isn’t it?"

He could do what no other thug had done! He would beat Baron Randolph Stormslayer at his own game. Hope came to his soul like the sun coming through the barred window of the cell. He attempted to laugh; it came out like a chicken being choked to death for dinner.

The hope lit up his soul, and for a brief moment he was free again. Free of these four walls. Beating the Baron! His laughter echoed across the walls. Other prisoners joined in his mirth. They did not know the reason for his laughter, but any semblance of hope in this dire location was seized upon. The only thing he heard was his own choking laughter, and that of the other prisoners. He did not hear the door open.

"You seem to be enjoying your stay here."

His laughter caught in his throat. He was silenced by the Baron’s presence. He smiled at the Baron. It was a cruel grin, the grin of someone who knows something that others do not.

"I see you think that I cannot break you," he said softly. "You are wrong. I can, and I will. It is all a matter of time. You and I have nothing but time. You are about to have far more of it."

His smile died. He did not know what the Baron meant. He could hear the Baron chanting something arcane. He was not trained as a spellcaster; he could not tell what kind of spell it was. A brick disappeared from the wall he was leaning on. He heard the Baron laugh gently.

"You weary me. You will break; I am not going to spend any more time concerning myself with the matter. When you break, I will know."

The Baron began casting again. The prisoner felt a tingling come over him. He felt stronger, but he was getting smaller, much smaller.

"You think that you will die in these four walls? You are quite wrong. You will not die. You will remain in these four walls until they come down around you."

He was shrinking, becoming smaller, more compact. His skin was getting harder. His arms, legs, and head were all now part of his torso, and he was still getting smaller and harder. He felt his limbs and head and body meld into four long sides and two short sides. His mind recoiled in horror.

"That should fit nicely."

He felt the Baron pick him up one-handed, and flip him short side over short side. He was then turned so that his long sides were facing the Baron. He felt himself slide into the space left in the wall where the brick had been. He could still hear, he could still feel. He was stone. He heard the Baron open the door and walk out.

"Guard, the prisoner is no longer an issue," his voice said, more distant now. "But I believe that he was trying to escape. There is a loose brick. Send for a mason to seal it in again."

He screamed, and screamed, and screamed. No one heard him. The Baron just smiled walking up the stairs. The prisoner would break, but he would never leave those four walls.