Quoted By:
<span class="mu-i">THREE YEARS EARLIER</span>
<span class="mu-i">Over Hadrian's Sea</span>
You are Freiherrin Clarissa zu Engels-Halsgaard, and you have had better days.
Two days ago at this time, you were the top of the world - dancing, laughing, flirting, on a leisure cruise. Now, you are cold, hungry, thirsty, and there are no tears left in you. You have been manhandled, subjected to near drowning for hours. You were threatened with death and rape, not necessarily in that order. And you were left to rot in a cell smelling of urine and machine oil.
<span class="mu-i">Der Lindwurm</span> - as you've seen the ship called in several plaques, even as you were escorted to your torture - doesn't have much of a brig. You are in a dark room that only has a small window several inches across, but even that is barred, as if someone could really contemplate escaping through it. Even assuming you could fit through (which you can't), this is an airship, so the only way to escape is to plummet thousands of yards. The rhythmic <span class="mu-i">thud-thud-thud</span> of the propellers is your only company.
In the end, the torture didn't work. You didn't tell these swine your name. You are certain it would have made no difference. You've had time to think it over. Their orders say "no witnesses". You are a witness. The only reason they weren't able to break you at that time is that you were somewhat numb from the destruction of the Empress. It was just too much to handle.
They really destroyed a ship with all hands and passengers. Left it to fall out of the sky. Killed all those people... Kiled Mitzi.
And the water torture... for what purpose? Yes, you had pretended to be a League countess. That was never going to survive more than a cursory inspection (but you had hoped that the inspection would only be conducted after you were safely away from the ship). You didn't even impersonate her in order to save yourself - you did it so that you could cause a temporary ruckus on the <span class="mu-i">Empress</span>, hoping--
What <span class="mu-i">were</span> you hoping for, actually? That <span class="mu-i">Der Lindwurm</span> would conveniently fly away, leaving the boiler room man to miraculously prevent the <span class="mu-i">Empress</span> from falling to its doom? Well, whatever it was, it didn't work. And the Boiler Room Man did nothing. Why would you ever put any stock in such a man?
While it is true that you are out of your usual element, you are still not robbed of your faculties. You could tell the little signs, even as you struggled for aer in between the bucket-drownings. You could see plainly that these ruffians were not used to dealing with a woman, let alone a borderline hysterical one. If you were the toughest man in the world, you are sure they would find a way to make you talk. But they didn't know how to approach you and didn't resort to inflicting lasting harm.
