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There are two people in the cell. One of them - hands cuffed before him, sitting back against the wall in bruised exhaustion, face shadowed with pain and fatigue - is the prisoner, a deep graze across one shoulder still showing the pattern of the mail he wore when caught by a sword-blow in the battle some days past; more recent injuries trace their presence across his face, show themselves in the bloodied scrapes at his wrists where he fought against the cuffs.
The other is the monster.
"Come, now," the monster is saying - its voice lovely; melodious. "Let me help you, Tyelpe; I don't like to see you this way."
It kneels, elegantly, at the prisoner's side, and reaches out towards the bruise darkening over one cheekbone; but the prisoner flinches away, turning his head and gritting his teeth, raising his bound hands as if to defend himself.
"Don't - " the prisoner says, and then cuts himself off, as if already regretting even that single word; but the monster only sighs, and continues its motion. It takes the prisoner's jaw in its hand; draws his face back towards it in a gesture no less forcible for all its appearance of gentleness.
"You're so hurt," it says, almost in a tone of surprise. "Oh, look at you - here." It smooths its thumb over the deep bruises on his face, eyes widening, cat-slit pupils dilating visibly at the sight; ignoring the prisoner's wince at the touch. "Tyelperinquar, dear one - "
"I wish," says the prisoner, with some difficulty, "that you'd stop that, please - "
"Of course," the monster says, soothingly, and withdraws its hand. "You can have anything you ask of me, Tyelpe, you know that."
The prisoner makes a harsh, choked-off sound; after a moment, it becomes identifiable as laughter.
A pause.
"Well, then" the monster says - standing, brushing its hands off. "Another time, I suppose."
It leaves.
The prisoner does not, as such things go, relax. The monster - experienced, intelligent - knows better than to put his torment entirely in its own hands; the pattern is one of pain, and then the monster's soothing voice and soft, affectionate touches. Its absence does not by any means indicate respite.
Still, the prisoner closes his eyes: tries, in the time he has, to sleep.
***
Another few days, perhaps. The count of hours goes on: rest is snatched at intervals, pain stretches out brief moments into subjective endlessness. The waiting combines the misery of both anticipation and - horribly - boredom, the mind reduced to wearily turning the same few thoughts over and over: is there hope of escape, what is happening, what will they do to me next -
"They tell me you haven't been eating," the monster says, gently. It enters with a tray this time, incongruous amid the bare chill stone of the cell: elegantly patterned porcelain; gleaming silver cutlery; a neatly-folded napkin of white linen. "Come now, Tyelpe, you know that won't do."
The prisoner says nothing; turns his head away, in order not to look.
"It's hard for you, of course," the monster says, settling itself down beside him, cross-legged; it puts the tray to one side. "I do understand that. But Tyelpe, I really can't stand to see you this way - truly, I hate what this is doing to you - "
The prisoner's eyes narrow, anger fighting back against exhaustion.
"Do you think I don't know," he says, "that this is all on your orders - I mean, do you think I'll somehow forget - "
The monster sighs.
"All you have to do is let me help you," it says. "Is that really so difficult? You should be trying to keep your strength up, you know - you might think otherwise, but I can assure you, weakening yourself won't help anything at all."
The prisoner says nothing; but his gaze darts, briefly, towards the tray, drawn despite himself by the warm aromatic scent after days of privation: the richness of meat; fresh bread; the complexity of spices and herbs.
"I do admire your bravery," the monster says, watching him carefully. "But is this really doing you any good, Tyelpe?"
It hesitates.
"The guards can make you eat, if they have to," it adds, delicately. "I'm sure we'd both rather they didn't have to, of course."
"Oh, of course," the prisoner says, still angry; but he can't stop looking at the tray, now. "I wouldn't want to distress you or anything - "
"Well, that's good to hear," the monster says, smiling, expression bright. It reaches over to the tray and picks up a bowl of soup with one hand, dipping the spoon in with the other; raises the spoon to the prisoner's mouth, ignoring his attempts to lift his hands and take it for himself. "Here, Tyelpe - "
Hunger overcomes pride. The prisoner eats.
"Thank you," he can't stop himself from saying, reflexively, afterwards; and the monster smiles at him again, tender and satisfied.
***
Time continues to pass unevenly. The light through the high, narrow window seems to flicker and fluctuate at odd times; meals come at irregular hours.
The prisoner's injuries are worse again, this time. Stripped to the waist, his skin shows burn marks and bruises; does not show how they forced his head under water until the panicked animal reflex of terror overcame him, nor the myriad smaller abuses that such helplessness invites -
He is trying, without complete success, not to cry, huddled in a corner with his face pressed into his knees; all too aware of the consequences of weakness and despair.
The monster enters: takes in the situation with a single sweeping glance, and goes to him at once.
"Tyelpe - " it says, dropping down beside him and coiling itself around him, throwing a fold of its overrobe around them both. "Shhh, now, it's alright, I'm here - "
The prisoner makes a choked noise, shuddering, curling in on himself further; torn between the desire to get away, shove and snap until the monster leaves, and the awful desire to accept it, take whatever comfort he can, let himself be soothed -
He tries to simply - go blank, focus down on his breathing, block out the world around him entirely.
"Oh, Tyelpe," the monster says, very gently, leaning its cheek against the crown of his head; "what am I supposed to do with you?" and he can't help relaxing into its touch, even knowing that the safety it seems to offer is the very worst kind of danger.
It would keep him safe, he thinks. He would only have to let it.
"No," he says, then, remembering himself, pushing it away as he sits up. "Stop it, get away from me - "
The monster leans back, away from him, but continues to rest a hand on his knee. The look of sympathy on its face is terrible.
"I do hate seeing you like this," it says. "This can't go on, Tyelpe. You must know that."
"Stop touching me," the prisoner snaps, but the monster only sighs, smoothing its hand over his leg in continued affection; and there is no way, really, for the prisoner to make it leave.
***
The intervals grow more and more confusing. The prisoner sleeps only fitfully, disturbed by pain and a kind of tense fear that has despite his best efforts settled its way into his bones, making his heartbeat race at nothing; he finds himself chafing his already-injured wrists against the metal of the cuffs he continues to wear, no matter how it pains him; thinking compulsively of how, and in what ways, he would need to damage his hands in order to get them off.
He - dozes, briefly, sitting up against the wall; and then wakes up, startled, all at once as he sees the monster sitting cross-legged before him, its lambent gaze studying his face.
He missed it come in, he realises, and feels again the irrational skip of fear, knowing it can see the way he has to restrain himself from flinching.
"Well?" he asks, after a pause; unable simply to wait for whatever it has in mind.
"I really am growing tired of this, Tyelperinquar," the monster says, very calmly, its face grave. It reaches out to take its hands in his, studying the open wounds at his wrists; raises them in its own, and kisses the back of one, mouth gentle against the knuckle. The prisoner closes his eyes, for a moment; contemplates the effort of pulling away.
"What is it - " he says, with an effort, and the monster looks up at him again, unnatural eyes steady.
"Enough," it says. "Don't you know how easily you could have anything you want from me, with just a word? No more of this, Tyelpe; no-one would ever dare hurt you again, I promise you." It smiles, a little, very gently. "I want you at my side, Tyelperinquar, where you ought to be: anything that is mine will be yours; all my plans set out before your gaze, and if anything should require correction, yours will be the power to change it.
"Wouldn't that be better?" it asks, its hands warm upon his own; cat-eyes bright with reflected light, it sits before him, lovely and alien, relentlessly affectionate. "What good do you think you're doing here, Tyelperinquar? What are you achieving that outweighs that?"
The moment stretches out.
"I - please, just go," the prisoner says, thinly.
"If that's what you want," the monster says, sounding disappointed. It raises his hands in its once more; presses its cheek against them, half-closing its eyes. "It's alright, Tyelpe. You can ask for me at any time, if you change your mind."
***
There is no real way to distinguish between suffering and suffering. The prisoner feels, vaguely, that the degree of torment may have increased, as if his captors were growing frustrated; but he is also, he realises, nearing the end of his own endurance.
Defiance worn down by slow degrees of humiliation: there is little left to him, now, but a tired determination; the knowledge that he had, in better times, promised himself that he would not yield. That there was nothing that would be worth the price of submission.
He falls asleep, curled up in a corner of the cell, and wakes abruptly to the monster kneeling over him, stretching out its hand to hover over the lash-marks now curving their way over his sides and back: deep, bloody gashes that shred into the muscle, ugly and vicious.
"Tyelperinquar," the monster says; and the prisoner flinches, the motion restarting a sluggish flow of blood from unhealed wounds.
The monster sees this, and something passes across its own face; it withdraws its hand.
"Tyelpe, don't you want this to stop?" it asks. It looks at him, eyes widened, mouth a thin set line of unhappiness. "I won't see you hurt like this - I will punish everyone who ever set their hand against you, no-one will ever dare treat you so again - only you have to let me, Tyelpe," it says. "Surely you don't want this, sweetness - "
The prisoner becomes aware, as if at a distance, that he is crying; tries to put his hands up to cover his face. Every movement is pain.
"Tyelperinquar -" the monster says, again, and something in him thinks, still, if only -
"Please," he says, unclearly; pauses to swallow, chokes back tears enough to speak. He can't seem to stop crying; already he feels ashamed. "Please, I don't want to do this any more - "
"Tyelpe," the monster says, at once. "Yes, Tyelpe, of course; you had only to say. You only ever had to say."
It reaches out to touch his face; smoothes its fingers gently against his cheekbone, careful of the bruises; and he closes his eyes, turning his face into the touch, shaking.
"Tyelpe," the monster says, almost crooning with pleasure. "I've missed you so much. I want to give you everything - set the world beneath your feet, Tyelperinquar, yours and mine - anything you want, Tyelpe, anything at all - "
It's not so bad, he thinks. I only have to let it take care of me. That's not so bad, is it?
And -
"You will tell me where the Three are, now, won't you?" it says.
- for a moment, there is nothing but triumph in its eyes, pure and exultant.
Did you think, he remembers his own voice saying, that I would somehow forget this was all on your orders -
***
"Please," the prisoner says again, crying. "No, I won't, but please - "
"But I can give you everything, Tyelpe," the monster says, surprised and displeased; "you only have to give me this - "
"No - no - "
"I suppose you don't want anything from me, then," the monster says, drawing its hand away.
***
The prisoner keeps crying for a long time, afterwards.
***
Outside the cell, the monster wipes the blood from its hands with a linen cloth; its movements delicate, fastidious.
"I'm starting to think," it says with a sigh to one of the guards, "that he's really not going to tell me, after all."
It pauses, thoughtful, a look of real regret passing over its face.
"It's such a waste," it says. "I'd no sooner throw him away than I'd toss one of the Rings into the furnace for scrap. I spent centuries on him; I feel almost like - like I'm having to break something I made myself."
It hesitates.
"Is that how it feels?" it asks; although the guard, wisely, remains silent. "To care about someone?"
Then, after a moment, it smiles again, tossing the cloth to one side. "Still," it says, "I think I can find a use for him, even now." It cheers up, visibly, as it speaks, returning to something like its normal air of radiance.
"Yes; I really do think he can still be useful. How nice," it says, its smile widening, "when things work out that way."