Myrren's Gift by Fiona McIntosh

hearing your arms dislocating. My favorite sound.” He all but shivered with delighted anticipation. “And did you notice the hundred-pound weights, my dear? Well, as you can see—if you would only look—they are attached to your feet now and they, of course, will do their best to fight the Angel to prevent your body leaving the ground, thereby assisting us in dislocating your hip joints. Oh, glorious agony! Incidentally, we have decided to bypass the somewhat tedious second degree and go straight to the third to save time and a great deal of pointless screaming. I hope that’s agreeable to you?” He laughed jovially and everyone except Wyl joined him.
    Myrren turned her face away.
    “Oh, and, Myrren,” he added, “I nearly forgot—how careless of me. I thought I’d throw in what I like to call Dark Angel Swoops for good measure. Perhaps you don’t know what that is? It’s the most exquisite suffering I think I could possibly inflict without actually drawing blood. This is when we will let go of the Angel’s ropes—just momentarily—and you, of course, my dear, will fall from the sky. But oh—and this is the good bit—my men will suddenly halt that swoop to the ground by grabbing the rope and you just can’t imagine what torment that’s going to mean for those suffering sockets and limbs, long past their pain barriers. Now, do be a good girl and confess after the first flight and drop because you should know that by law I have another three times to inflict it. It will hurt a great deal more by the fourth and I do think it’s more noble to die by the flames than hanging dead and broken on the ropes, don’t you?” This time Wyl wanted to applaud loudly when she spat at him. but he held his composure watching her turn her back to her tormentor in a last show of defiance. It was but a momentary triumph.
    “Hoist the witch—let’s watch the Dark Angel fly,” he said viciously and his henchmen obeyed, hauling on the rope attached to a pulley.
    Wyl felt his stomach contents lurch into his throat as he heard the inevitable and sickening sound of Myrren’s shoulders capitulating almost immediately. As the first of her limb sockets popped, Wyl’s midday meal burst onto his boots but few paid him any attention, except Celimus, who pushed him aside to avoid being splattered.
    The Prince was laughing, though, and Wyl knew Celimus was revelling in Wyl’s obvious squeamishness at watching a woman suffer.
    “Trust you’re enjoying my surprise. General,” he growled for Wyl’s hearing only.
    This was what he had wanted, Wyl knew, to finally unsettle his Champion-to-be into humiliating himself.
    It was true that plenty of other watchers looked away or retched at the hideous sound of her shoulders releasing their arms but only Wyl’s discomfort counted for Celimus.
    No one in that room heard Myrren utter a sound.
    They dropped Myrren time and again that afternoon, all the while demanding she confess herself a witch and failing. For several periods she appeared unconscious, presumably from the torturous pain. Wyl could not comprehend how she resisted, for he felt weak from her trauma. He felt sure many were quietly in awe of the courage it took to repel such an assault, for none would be able to imagine the level of punishment her body withstood.
    Lymbert, coolly detached, expertly revived Myrren on each occasion with strong smelling salts and a dousing of freezing water. Still her mouth was firmly closed to any sound, although every other opening of her body slackened with the shock of her trauma, and if she were able, Wyl thought she might have even derived some satisfaction from the effect her loosened muscles had. Initially the chamber had smelled of men’s sweat and lust. Now it smelled like a cesspit and a few experienced trial attendees held perfumed linens to their noses.
    Knowing this was a test of his own nerves but also frozen with fear at what this young woman endured, Wyl remained as still now as