in this desert you are king IV

and i am languishing in the dungeon. i have been held here in the room without windows for so long i don't know if it is night or day or weeks or months. my screams and cries echo in the walls of the chamber and the deep pit is where they put me when they have tired of flogging and cutting me. i never know when i am going to be awoken for more slapping and questioning. i never know when the session is going to end. i think that is how they want it.

The questions are the same everytime: who, where, what, how. though it is hardly ever asked why. perhaps they don't care, though maybe i could tell them. that would be one of the few things i could actually tell them. They are preoccupied with who and what, the facts and facts of it all. they think that they can beat the answers out of me, that with every finger digit they rip off and every curdling scream i make they come closer to knowing what they want. Everytime my head is dunked they think i come closer to telling them what they want to know. But i will never tell them. Because i do not know. It gives me great pleasure to know that they cannot get what they want, no matter how many of my teeth they pull out. It makes them mad to see me light up when i think about it, and then they redouble their efforts.

You used to preside over the events when i first came in here. You coolly applied the red hot brand to my skin, listening while i howled with your head inclined ever so gently. A servant gave you a glass of water and a towel to wipe your hands with afterwards. Did it start then, with the sense of satisfaction at seeing your emblem burned into my thigh? I saw you more often than expected, you seemed to drop by the dungeon frequently to inquire about the questioning, and stayed longer than i or the torturers expected. Do you want to know these things too? So many times when i was bound to the wheel you brought your face close to mine, and asked me the same questions they did. I gave you the same answers. You looked away disappointed, and finally you slapped me.

I live in the dungeon but we have not forgotten those who have forgotten us. Every scrap of talk and gossip eventually finds its way down here. I heard you lost interest in your games and jesters, looking on boredly at the ingenious little distractions or large spectacles put up for your entertainment. I heard you looked like a ghost, while sat on the large cushioned throne, looking through the ambassadors and petitioners queuing to say flowery words to you. The scented tea in the porcelain cups which you treasure so much goes cold in your hands, untouched until it is time for another cup to be made. - We the forgotten are hungry to know what the forgetting world outside does.

You began to spend more time in the dungeons, and took to participating in the interrogations, yelling in my ear and making threats, using the whip liberally. The courtiers and corridors talked about how your appetites changed, how the dances changed in tone and the parties became harsh orgies. The halls resonate with how bored you are by the flawless skin and velvety luscious ways of the nubile dancers and prancers who punctuated your evenings. You spent more time questioning me than signing documents, your clean starched robes ever more splattered with the blood from my body from the strokes.

I tell you nothing but you don't stop questioning, demanding. You have taken to it with relish, with the concern for the truth and safety of the kingdom as your foil. My harried shrieks of pain and my cries of mercy will yield no fruit and no secrets, but you continue anyway. But i know you don't care, in fact you are glad i divulge nothing so that you can go on beating me. You are early to get here, you don't leave till late judging by the meals that are now served here in the chamber. I know you would rather be here than upstairs in your throne room. I can feel you thinking of me when the edicts are presented to you for signing at the beginning of every morning and when the countless affairs of state are read to you for consideration. I can sense it when you walk into my dungeon, when you eagerly grasp the whip or other implement and start on me. I can hear it in your breathing, coming in gasps during the pauses between flogging, fast and shallow the more i scream, and the tender way you touch my back and rub the salt into the wounds. You whisper to me, tell me the truth, and this will stop. But that will never happen -you want to break me, but if i break you will not have the pleasure of the breaking any longer.

in this desert you are king and the state is going to pieces while you linger in this dungeon with me. You are tired of your delicious perfect whores and long for something bloodier and darker. We both know no amount of torture will yield any secrets from me, but you are not here to learn any secrets. The black clad torturers have taken a back seat, and you handle the tools with tenderness. The howls of agony that emanate from me last hours until my voice gives out in a dry croak, and every cry and spasm of pain from me only fuels you more. Soon you will be here at all hours of the day, sick of your sunlight filled gardens and billowing sheer curtains and soft pillows, taking in the dark and rat infested room what they can never give you. And i, joined to you in pain, will have achieved what you never believed i would.