General Vahit was watching the elf closely, expression wholly unsympathetic to his plight. He was only trying to decide if the creature was useful to him in some way. It threw them both off that he'd happened to travel so close without really meaning to. If they'd simply caught him in a skirmish he would have been lined up and executed with the other prisoners they caught, but he was claiming to be a simple outcast. Not someone of military standing at all, but that didn't mean he still couldn't be a spy with the hopes of gathering information to make an escape. All they could do was try and validate his story if he even wanted to go to the trouble.<br/><br/>“You were caring for someone that is sick. What does that make you, paired with your alchemy? Some sort of witch doctor?” Vahit snapped, though there was some measure of thought behind his dark gaze. “If you'd have found what you were looking for do you think you really might have been able to help her? Or was this a careless move out of desperation to try and save someone you were fond of? Or do you possess skill, and just no sense?” There was information to be gathered. Something from everyone, even if they might not imagine it was particularly useful. He just had to dig in the right sort of ways.<br/><br/>“Why did they cast you from your home?” Vahit pressed, “Are you some sort of criminal then? Maybe you were running for a reason.” He licked his lips.<br/><br/>“We all have information. Even pretty outcasts with sob stories about caring for a sick girl back at home.” It was clear there was some part of the story Vahit didn't believe entirely, and Malta would guess it was the altruistic one about the girl, but he himself didn't know anything for certain. He didn't possess Vahit's sharpness for these sort of things, nor his intimidating demeanor as he assaulted him with questions.<br/><br/>“You still know nothing?” The man rose from his desk, and Malta was watching, unsure what he might do as he came around to the elf who was starting to break. He flipped him to face him and pushed him back onto the desk.<br/><br/>“Malta, hold him,” the man instructed, and the larger man did as his general ordered, though he wasn't entirely sure why until Vahit found a dagger in the drawer of his desk. Malta pinned the smaller male between him in the desk and then leaned his upper body over him, prepared to help subdue any squirming. Vahit took his tear-stained face in hand, and then put the dagger to the unblemished side, just beneath his eye.<br/><br/>“It's time to tell me something. Your life story. What you'd hoped to find. What crime you committed. Why I should believe that you're not some spy sent to appear unassuming,” Vahit went on, his patience running thin. He wasn't a particularly cruel man in Malta's eyes. He'd never seen the General do anything to someone unless he thought he could gain something but he wouldn't advise the little elf to test him.<br/><br/>“<i>I know nothing</i>does not work for me. It doesn't work for you either, not unless you want to be carved up symmetrically on both sides, but I will warn you, I've no steady hand,” Vahit snarled. “I'd advise that you try to change my mind. Malta here doesn't like this sort of thing, and I'm too tired tonight to switch him out for a more inclined soldier.” In the heat of battle Malta was one to contend with, but after, with prisoners subdued and helpless, he had no real mind for torture though it didn't show. That wasn't to say he wouldn't take him to bed if Vahit allowed it. His men had been without pleasures of the flesh for a long while, also something to take into consideration.