Think on the dungeon’s grim confine, Where Guilt and poor Misfortune pine! [open] (original) (raw)

Who: Sir James de Molyneaux, Sir Guy of Gisborne,
What: Go directly to jail. Do not pass “go.” Do not collect $200.
Where: Nottingham Castle dungeon
When: October 10, immediately following the Council of Nobles

Gisborne looked prideful. Vaizey looked gleeful. Sir James didn’t particularly try to examine at the others in the room, his fellow nobles gathered, theoretically, to give Prince Johan via Vaizey their “advice and consent,” so he couldn’t tell what their reaction to all this was—he expected it was the usual combination of giggles and gasps that came from the embarrassment of watching one of your own brought low.

Pride and shame battled it out within Sir James, with a few other stray emotions thrown in just to make things that much more confusing. On the one hand, it was humiliating to be arrested in front of everyone like this. On the other, he was confident that in the great moral list of rights and wrongs, his actions at the Council were firmly in the “right” column. (Were they as tactful and clever as they could have been? That didn’t bear thinking about now; that kind of analysis was what prison cells were good for.) He was also furious at the way Vaizey ran his shire, disgusted at the way the other nobles acquiesced, and contemptuous of Gisborne and Lucatz and all of Vaizey’s other lackeys for…well, for being lackeys and not having the wherewithal to say, “Screw you, I’ve had enough of this” to Vaizey, or probably to even realize they were acting and being treated dishonorably simply by being in his service.

He felt Gisborne’s hand tighten on his arm and the two of them moved forward, towards the door. And they kept going—through the corridor, around the kitchen corner, down the stairs. Sir James stumbled a couple of times because of the unfamiliar ground and having to move according to Gisborne’s natural stride instead of his own. Gisborne accommodated him, but never loosened his grip, and never said a word.

Sir James observed everything they passed with the interest of a tourist (“Ooh, look! They use parchment on their windows here!”) even though he had seen much of it before in his quest for Robin’s gang on Michaelmas night. He invariably and unwittingly retreated to that kind of intellectual detachment whenever he was faced with a hopeless situation—it was that or have a meltdown. Later, when the immediate crisis had passed and the problem had either resolved itself or become chronic rather than acute—as this one would most likely be—was when he could become emotional, trusting the fire to have dampened down a bit by then.

They finally got to the dungeon itself. It was dark, and damp, and dank, just like every other dungeon, and seemed to be quite large. Someone moaned piteously in the distance. (Sir James half wondered if the man was on Vaizey’s payroll, hired to provide the proper chilling effect.) Gisborne marched Sir James to a cell. It was smallish, but it was his own, which he found to be a great relief—the fear that kept poking through his mental reserves was of living cheek-by-jowl with his fellow prisoners, chained to some stranger, unable to wipe his own ass without the cooperation of another.

The door to the cell clanged shut. Sir James leaned against the bars and spoke his first words since his arrest.

“So, Gisborne, how does this place work? Do you feed me but bill me for my room and board later?” he asked, briskly. “Or do you provide straw and bread and water and I have to arrange for any extras myself? Is that how the jailer earns his income, feeding and supplying the prisoners? That’s how they do it in Rennes. Or can I have people bring me things from home? And what about upgrades for good behavior—larger quarters and all that? Hmmm?"

Godmodded with permission.