he reached to the entrails and the liver. men leaned over tables and shovelled coal. their pink cheeks glowed. you stood with a hand at your breast and the candle burning you. on the stairs were men in armour; their swords flickered. with your back towards them, they heated irons in the coal. they lifted your leg up and put it on the table. moving with my hands behind me, i felt an iron ring in the stone. if i pulled, there would be a tunnel: i could put an iron bar across the hole. at the end of it would be a cell. there i had been all winter. […]