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Queen Of Chaos

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I am hanging naked to a hoist, by my hands and feet all cuffed together. Quite painful and laborious, my body being folded tightly. It gives a terrible pressure on my stomach, and on my chest, making breathing very heavy. My head is a problem. Letting it hang backward is painful and sickening. Pulling it up causes cramp in my neck and shoulders. In the floor under me is a drain for liquid. Not a luxury, because my situation sometimes makes it difficult to control the emission of body fluids. And that’s not all that has to be drained. I now see men approaching from two sides, each with a watering can in their hand. One with a spray nozzle, one without. And if they empty both at the same time in my face, two times two and a half gallons, it is impossible to prevent the water gushing into all the cavities in my head. Closing my mouth does not help, because the water violently flows into my nostrils, so I need to open my mouth to get air. In vain! I get choked.
My nose is full of water, my throat and my mouth too! I am hang here about to drown, even before the watering cans are half empty! I sneeze! I shake my head. I get terrified. I pull the straps around my limbs to get away from the watering cans. I try to rock my body, but my body responds too slow. I want to cry out, but I can't. I want to call that they must stop, but I cannot, because if I open my mouth, water rushes in. While the waterfall endlessly persists, I get seized by an indescribable panic.
Then it is over. Coughing and spluttering, I try to gasp back to life. Air! At last! They let me recover, while refilling the watering cans at the water tap. However, it takes minutes before I feel more or less normal again. Meanwhile, the refilled watering cans are waiting.
Well, Luisa, if you want us to stop, you have to tell us something?" I sighed for a moment and nodded my head.
"Do you? Tell us, Luisa!”
“My name is not Luisa Schneider!”
“No, Luisa? Then tell us who you are!”
"Je...je suis Aurore d'Artois!"


Do you recall? It happened in Episode 4, some time ago already since it was posted. A brief leap forward in time in Aurore's life.
Or was the story up to now a last flashback of Luisa/Aurore, on her life, as she suffers water torture?

Or was it all a bad dream? No water torture, but Queen Aurore simply walking out of the shower? Telling her husband : "Robert, I had a strange dream last night! I was abducted by Lisa Kellermann to Slovenia, where I became a member of a rebel group. After a botched assassination, I had to flee to Chaos, an Island far away, where I took up an ordinary life for years! One day, our son Robert arrived there, as an army officer, but he did not know whom I was!"

Will Aurore d'Artois become Queen of France, or wll she be Luisa Schneider, Queen of Chaos? Triumph or agony? Is Lieutenant d'Artois her son? Who is the stranger who knows her real identity? Will she learn the thruth about her father? What happened to Lisa Kellermann in Laibach? And to Benoît d'Artois? Will she get away with the bloody shooting in the villa? Or is she in trouble because of Montesquieu's forbidden book?

Coming up : Part 4 of Queen of Chaos!
 
Part 4 - episode 29

I am hanging naked to a hoist, by my hands and feet all cuffed together. Quite painful and laborious, my body being folded tightly. It gives a terrible pressure on my stomach, and on my chest, making breathing very heavy. My head is a problem. Letting it hang backward is painful and sickening. Pulling it up causes cramp in my neck and shoulders. In the floor under me is a drain for liquid. Not a luxury, because my situation sometimes makes it difficult to control the emission of body fluids. And that’s not all that has to be drained. I now see men approaching from two sides, each with a watering can in their hand. One with a spray nozzle, one without. And if they empty both at the same time in my face, two times two and a half gallons, it is impossible to prevent the water gushing into all the cavities in my head. Closing my mouth does not help, because the water violently flows into my nostrils, so I need to open my mouth to get air. In vain! I get choked.

My nose is full of water, my throat and my mouth too! I am hang here about to drown, even before the watering cans are half empty! I sneeze! I shake my head. I get terrified. I pull the straps around my limbs to get away from the watering cans. I try to rock my body, but my body responds too slow. I want to cry out, but I can't. I want to call that they must stop, but I cannot, because if I open my mouth, water rushes in. While the waterfall endlessly persists, I get seized by an indescribable panic.
Then it is over. Coughing and spluttering, I try to gasp back to life. Air! At last! They let me recover, while refilling the watering cans at the water tap. However, it takes minutes before I feel more or less normal again. Meanwhile, the refilled watering cans are waiting.
Well, Luisa, if you want us to stop, you have to tell us something?" I sighed for a moment and nodded my head.
"Do you? Tell us, Luisa!”
“My name is not Luisa Schneider!”
“No, Luisa? Then tell us who you are!”
"Je...je suis Aurore d'Artois!"

"What do you say, Luisa?"
The main interrogator had joined the torturers.
"I said I am Aurore d'Artois"
"Then you're not Luisa Schneider?"
"No!"
"Then, your Passport, which states that you are Luisa Schneider, is forged?"
"Yes!"
"Interesting evolution! And why are you here under a false name? What have you got to hide?"
"Nothing! I'm Aurore d'Artois! I have nothing to hide!"
"Come on! Why are you here on Chaos? "
"I have been kidnapped from France by Illyrian nationalists. Later I learned that my family was involved in a plot against King Jacques! But I was no part of it! Believe me! In the end, my kidnappers send me here, because the situation in Illyria had become unsafe for me!"
"Her fantasy is running wild! Shall we dunk her another time?"
"No, please, believe me, really. I'm Aurore d'Artois! I am the mother of Lieutenant d'Artois!"
"Whose mother, you say?"
"Lieutenant Robert d'Artois, who is part of the French detachment."
"Aha! That Lieutenant d'Artois? And you pretend to be his mother, Luisa? Nice try, but I think you are inventing stories to distract me! Gentlemen, give her more water!"
“Noooonglblblbl!”

"Listen here, Luisa! Or whoever you claim to be."
"Quoi? "I asked, while I tried to recover from the last waterfalls.
"You've got yourself betrayed. Why would you seek personal information of Lieutenant d'Artois? That can only mean one thing! Espionage is it called! "
"But no! I'm his mother! Aurore d'Artois! Check it out! I know his date of birth, I know…."
"Nice try, Luisa, but you do not fool us. We know that you have tried regularly to get access to the French barracks, on the pretext that every subject of the King of France would be entitled with that privilege. That is a classic method. Using feminine charms to gather information. Seducing officers to exploit their nostalgia for home! But I have never experienced that someone tried to infiltrate by pretending to be the mother of an officer! "
“But..”
“So, Luisa! Tell us what we really want to hear, instead of inventing silly stories!”
Once more, I had to undergo the water treatment. I was exhausted!
“I am Aurore d’Artois. I was born in Compiègne on the fourth of June 1966! I am wanted in France for conspiracy, but I am innocent!”

There I hung, dripping wet. my arms and legs felt terribly painful and numb at the same time. I could no more. My overstretched back did hurt. The pressure on my stomach was unbearable.
"Luisa! We can go on for hours here! But we will give you another chance to consider. You get just a little time to think. If you will not get wiser, then we start again, understood?"
But then they stepped again with those watering cans to me.
"Non!?"
"Don't worry! That is for the other side! You've got yourself soiled in the meantime! We are not that inhumane that we would return you that dirty to your cell! "

(to be continued)
 
Part 4 – episode 30

“Welcome back, Luisa!”
Air! I gasped! They had given me a few hours in my cell. I had no idea whether it was day or night, after all these detentions and interrogations. And it was getting worse. They had taken me out of my cell, stripped me naked again and hung me once more in an uncomfortable position. They said they would try ‘another treatment’! This time I was bent with my knees over a horizontal iron bar between two brick-built supports. My wrists were handcuffed together to the bar. My ankles were shackled. After they had hung up, they had immediately recommenced with their watering cans. This time it was even more awful, because in this position, my head hung even more backward.
"This was just a refreshing, Luisa, or whoever you pretend to be, in order to remind you that we do with you what we want!"
"I have told everything already you last time."
"You have told us some bizarre things, Luisa. But that does not interest us at the moment. How do you have that info on the Lieutenant? Who was your contact? And tell us about that murder! We want to hear about that!"
"But I have not murdered…!"
"Luisa, in your studio we have found a weapon that unambiguously can be associated with the murder of Captain Ramoz in Chaos city on the 20th of August!"
"But I have not done that!? I was to Kathalos that day, for a work meeting! There are witnesses... "
"In that case, Luisa, to whom you have lent that weapon? Or for whom were you hiding it?"
"But! No one!"
"Luisa! You really make things difficult! Give her more water!"
I went again through the wet hell.
“So, Luisa!? We keep silent?”
“Please let me down!”

I was rather moaning than talking. Especially the cramps and the pain in my knee cavity, and in my wrists and ankles which in the previous session had already been stressed, was gradually becoming unbearable. To relieve the pain I had to pull on my wrists. However, that was just the displacing the problem to my fingers. In addition, my backwards pending head made me feel vertiginous.
"Untie you? No, Luisa. But we give you a moment's rest. We know that the way you hang is painful, very painful. Very unpleasant! A torture on its own! We just leave you a moment, while we add something extra."
That 'something extra' turned out to be Maryszkà! They brought her in, stripped her naked and hung her next to me on the iron bar.
“Give her something to drink too!”

Without asking her a single question, they started pouring water over Maryszkà's face, like they had already done to me. Powerless I had to watch how she tried in vain to get away from under the jets of water and how she got more and more terrified, trying to keep the water from entering her mouth and nostrils, while trying to keep breathing. Whatever she did, shaking her head, trying to keep her breath, it all failed. I saw the increasing panic in her eyes. She began – or she tried at least – to trample and to struggle with her arms and legs, in the vain hope to break free. The iron bar was jolting up and down. Then it was finally over. They reached loudly for air, like a newborn who makes his first breath, but much louder, much more intense. A high, loud roar! Her face looked terrible, unrecognizable. Coughing and sniffing she tried to spit the water out of her lungs. Then she came back, slowly.
"So, Luisa, we have also invited your girlfriend, as you see. Maryszkà, that is her name, isn’t it? Well, Maryszkà, I have been informed that your two are friends. Good girl friends even, I heard. You see, Maryszkà, your girlfriend Luisa here, isn't really willing to cooperate with us. We expect from her a few answers to a few simple questions. But the only thing she does is telling us useless nonsense! You can perhaps help us?"
"Help!? How?"
"By giving Luisa some moral support!"
"Moral support?"
Right away they started again pouring water over Maryszkà's face. I had to witness the same scene as before.
"Tell us, Maryszkà, how long do you know Luisa?"
"Some ... ten years."
"Some ten years? And, how much children has Luisa?”
Maryszkà looked amazed at me to? Was the interrogation about that?
“None as far as I know."
"Strange, don't you think? Luisa tries to convince us that she has a son of about twenty years old. Someone we know. A son whom she has not seen for a long time! What mother would leave her child behind so long, and could keep silent about it? That's makes no sense, isn’t it?"
"I have two children, born in France. Robert and Enguerrand. And I got to leave them behind! By circumstances!" I interfered.
"Oh, Yes, Luisa, and why did you left them behind? What were those 'circumstances' that urge a mother to separate from her children two thousand miles away for so many years. Not a caring mother, I would think! What are you hiding, Luisa?"
"Nothing! Nothing at all! It was because my husband was accused of conspiracy against the King!"
“The conspiracy of the Artois! You already told us about that! You are an imposter, Luisa, a traitor, a murderer, a spy, a wicked seductress! Unfortunately for you, you come up with the most ridiculous story I ever heard!”
“But you can confront my story with the Lieutenant’s! You have me here! Do it!?”
“Luisa, you don’t have to give us orders! We are not going to force an officer of the King to cooperate to such an investigation against his will! Forget that! Luisa, let’s talk about the real facts! Tell us about the gun we found in your studio! Where did you get it from!?”
“I.. found it.”
“Oh yes, Luisa, everybody knows how guns are littered all over the streets! Dear Luisa! We have checked the origin of that weapon! It was originally a French army pistol. It was part of a lot that has been phased out and sold to Hungary in 1993. How did it come in your hands? Who gave it to you!? Or where have you stolen it?”
“No? Someone gave it to me!”
“First you have found it, then someone gave it to you!? There is something we have to tell you, Luisa! Every gun barrel is unique! That means that, when fired, every gun barrel leaves its own unique imprint on every bullet that is fired by it. It is a signature it leaves behind on every bullet! That signature allows to link a fired bullet to the weapon it was fired with! This weapon, Luisa, is used for the murder of Captain Ramoz! No doubt about it! But we have also discovered, Luisa, that it has been used for a much older murder, some twenty years ago! Tell us about that!?”
“I did not commit a murder!”
“Luisa, does the name Lisa Kellermann reminds you something!”
“Lisa? But… that’s impossible!”
“Lisa Kellermann has been shot dead by this weapon, in Slovenia, near Laibach, Luisa, with five shots!”
“But that is impossible! She was still alive when I got that gun!”
“We are coming closer, isn’t it Luisa? Lisa Kellermann worked for the Artois family you mention! Did you try then to infiltrate already!”
“That is ridiculous!”
“And the sixth bullet was for Captain Ramoz, who was about to reveal your past, right!?”
“I did not shoot Lisa, and I did not shoot the Captain!”
“Luisa, bullets do not fire by their own! Someone must pull a trigger! We need the truth from you, or you and your friend will spend more time on this bar! Let’s try something else.”

He took a thin wooden stick and gave with full force six strokes on the soles of my feet. The pain was enormous. I screamed. I could hardly imagine the pain from hanging to that iron bar, still could be surpassed by something worse. But instead, the two reinforced each other.
Then Maryszkà's soles were beaten. Not six, but twelve times. She also cried out with each stroke.
“Luisa, have you killed, or ordered to kill, Captain Ramoz!? Why and by whom!?”
“But I did not kill Captain Ramoz!”
“Luisa! Think! Consider! You are not alone here! We can give your friend more beatings on her soles, but we can making it worse by giving her a pedicure first!”
He took a wooden pin and put it under one of Maryszkà’s toe nails. Her screaming and writhing were terrible. Then he put a second one! I could not hear it anymore! I could not let this happen! What should I do?
A sergeant and Lieutenant d’Artois entered and had some talk with the chief interrogator. Then, they left again.
“Listen, Luisa,” the chief interrogator said, “I just heard your friend Judith has confessed about the murder of Captain Ramoz!”
“Hah!” I shouted, with my last forces, “I told you! Untie us and let us go, will you?”
“Not so fast, Luisa! You kept that weapon with you, and both your and Judith’s fingerprints are on it! You are at least an accomplice! Secondly, Judith has confessed more things. About spying! She has admitted she was part of a network, and she has named you and your friend here too! It looks bad for all of you!”

(to be continued)
 
Untie us and let us go, will you?”
“Not so fast, Luisa! You kept that weapon with you, and both your and Judith’s fingerprints are on it! You are at least an accomplice! Secondly, Judith has confessed more things. About spying! She has admitted she was part of a network, and she has named you and your friend here too! It looks bad for all of you!”

Out of the frying pan and into the fire, it would appear?
 
Part 4 – episode 31

Spying!? Because of the strategic position of Chaos in the Mediterranean Sea, a lot of obscure characters were willing to give money for all kinds of information. Judith had proposed me once, quite soon after my arrival on the island. An offer in which I would share in the profits. Although she had made clear to me that I should take the decision on a voluntary basis, and that it was not completely without danger, I could not resist the prospect of some cash-in-hand just to double my monthly income. For whom she worked, she did not reveal of course. She worked for an 'agency', which acted as an intermediary, or maybe she even sold her information to the highest bidder.

“We have also evidence and written confessions, that you two were involved in terrorist activities of Hellenic Dawn!”
“Which terrorist activity? There has been none!”
“Conspiring and making preparations with the intention to commit terrorist acts is also punishable, Luisa!”
“That is… ridiculous!”
"Shall we continue, Luisa? It all makes no longer sense to deny!"
"I ... I've participate in it too! But of murders I know nothing!" said Maryszkà suddenly. "I'm sorry Luisa!"
"So, one who uses her brains at least! But for the moment it will be no relief for your friend, Luisa, if you do not confesses too. Then we go on just as we were busy!"
"No! Leave her! I did too! If you want to hear!"
“Call the Lieutenant back!” the interrogator ordered.

It was a long time ago. It was actually not that difficult to get interesting information. Feminine charms open a lot of doors, especially to young, healthy officers sent to an assignment far away from home! No, I have not told you yet! Course not! I may be chaotic, but I am not stupid! But one thing I want to make clear: Jérôme, when I had a relationship with him, I have never abused! I had stopped with that already ten years ago, but I am still charged with it.

“Very good Luisa! What do you think, Lieutenant!?”
“Clean them up first!”
They poured some buckets of water over us (incredible how much water is spilled in the torture rooms of an island with a constant shortage of water). Then, the Lieutenant came to me and grabbed my hair, forcing me to face him.
“Stop it! It hurts!” I cried.
“Listen, you Alsacian whore! We shall let you pay for Captain Ramoz! Someone has also revealed you were member of Hellenic Dawn! We will charge you for that too!”
“But! I was…!”
“And stop with that stupid nonsense of pretending you are my mother!”
He released my hair. My head fell back with a painful jerk. Then he made a sign who gave him a long wooden stick. He pointed with it between my vagina and my anus!
“This part of the human body,” he said “is a very sensitive area, right? It is particularly sensitive to stimulate a woman’s sexual pleasures! It brings up excitement, I have been told! When it is teased softly and gently, it can bring a woman to heaven! But unfortunately, when this sensitive area….”
As he said that, he swung with the stick and hit me hard there! The initial superficial ache of the stroke exploded in a seemingly endless burning, breathtaking pain that made me scream of terror!
“… is struck the hard way, it can be very painfully! Isn’t it?”
Before I could answer, he struck a second time.
“That’s for all our gentle officers you have seduced, you wicked whore, and the pleasure you had from their attention and from luring them into your vicious trap! How does this little compensation feel right now, huh…!?”
He struck me four more times, every time with agonizing pain, which spread over my overstressed limbs, still attached to the iron bar.
“And these are for Captain Ramoz!”
He gave me six more strokes. Six more strokes of unbearable pain!
“Scream! You bloody whore!”
Then he turned to Maryszkà and hit her six times on the same place too.

He gave the stick back to the interrogator.
“What shall we do with them, Lieutenant!?”
“Do with them what you want! Just ensure they keep alive for the trial!”

Two days later we had to appear before a court martial. The rules were simple: the defendant had no attorney and there was no possibility of appeal. The explanation for that procedure was as simple. The military Attorney was an officer of the King. He was a man of honor and therefore he would never lower himself by bringing up lies, forged evidence or false argumentation for winning his case. He was a man of honor, so his conduct was ex officio honorable. The same applied to the military judge, who, by the virtue of his honor as an officer of the King, was supposed to judge the gravity of the alleged facts and accusations in an objective and unbiased way. The credibility of this system, it was said, was that appearing before such a court would not automatically lead to a conviction. These courts could be abused by passing slanderous allegations for facts, and the military judges were fully aware of that danger and as men of honor they were supposed to keep that in mind.

We sat all five together in the dock. A small wooden bench, where we had to sit close to each other. They had let me put on again the robe from Laibach. After a few weeks of imprisonment and harsh interrogation, it fitted me a little better again. But not quite as once before, as witnessed the rupture aside of my waist.

Judith looked terrible. She had bruises all over her body. Burn spots either. They must have treated her terribly. So, I abstained to question her about the pistol, she apparently had ‘borrowed’ from me without my knowledge, the day I had been to Kathalos, to finish off Captain Ramoz.

Olga also looked terribly beaten up. She had been taken on by Russian interrogators. The same for Smyrna, who had been dealing with the Greek secret service. All looked quiet but shaken.

The military judge read the indictment. The charge was espionage, murder, complicity to murder, membership of a terrorist organization and conspiracy. Then the military attorney got the word. He was indeed correct. He gave the material facts and the results of our interrogation. He considered the facts proven on the basis of this argumentation, so he asked the Court to find us guilty and he requested collectively the death penalty.

The verdict was spoken in the afternoon. One by one, we had to stand up to hear the judgement. Judith : guilty, Olga : guilty, Smyrna : guilty, me : guilty, Maryszkà : guilty. The judge told us that the court had followed the attorney’s request that our crimes had been committed as a conspiracy, so he would give all of us the same sentence.

The court then resigned for the last deliberation. It took longer than I had expected, but finally they returned.

“The Court-martial has made its verdict. Considering the accusations, of which the Court has judged that they are supported by sufficient prove, we have found the accused guilty! Considering the gravity of the accusations, acts that have strongly endangered the integrity and the security of the island of Chaos, its institutions, its inhabitants and the troops guarding the island. Considering that the accused did not eschew assassination and terrorism to reach their goals and to ensure their personal immunity, a strong signal to society is required!

In her verdict, the court has also taken into account that the accused were guests on the island, that its community has given the hospitality and protection and has allowed them to lead a normal life on Chaos!

The latter is an additional aggravating element in judging the accused’s’ crimes. Spying and assassination are very vile acts. The accused have betrayed the inhabitants and the institutions of the island of Chaos in the most despicable way!

The Court therefore considers that not only a severe punishment, the severest possible, should be applied, namely the death penalty. Not only the most severe punishment, but also a humiliating punishment, a punishment with an endless long death struggle. Because of the nature of the crimes, the convicts are denied the right to a quick and merciful death! Their sentence will also serve as an example and for deterrence, but especially to give the signal to the population that the powers and institutions on this island are concerned about their security! Any person who endangers the population’s security, will be severely punished, in public. The Court deems this is certainly appropriate in these times of international tension!”

Strange! It seemed hardly to realize that we had just had been condemned to death. I had expected another reaction. Much more emotional! We were all so worn out by the torture, or so ignorant about our fate?

“Considering the proof of conspiracy, all the condemned will be executed together, the same way. The execution will take place within forty-eight hours after it will have been publically announced! This public announcement will take place no later than tomorrow at midnight! The court has decided that, according to penal decree, the five convicts present here, will be condemned to the death on the cross!”

(to be continued)
 
Two days later we had to appear before a court martial. The rules were simple: the defendant had no attorney and there was no possibility of appeal. The explanation for that procedure was as simple. The military Attorney was an officer of the King. He was a man of honor and therefore he would never lower himself by bringing up lies, forged evidence or false argumentation for winning his case. He was a man of honor, so his conduct was ex officio honorable. The same applied to the military judge, who, by the virtue of his honor as an officer of the King, was supposed to judge the gravity of the alleged facts and accusations in an objective and unbiased way. The credibility of this system, it was said, was that appearing before such a court would not automatically lead to a conviction. These courts could be abused by passing slanderous allegations for facts, and the military judges were fully aware of that danger and as men of honor they were supposed to keep that in mind.

This sounds a lot like an Admi court in a Tree story ... the main situational difference being that the defendant has no attorney rather than an incompetent one, called Mr. Tree. OK, yeah, yeah ... the other situational difference is that in a Tree story the Judge is hardly a man of honor.

Sorry for the digression. Great writing ... keep the chapters coming, Lox! :popcorn:
 
Part 4 - Episode 32

Condemned to the cross! Olga and Maryszkà crossed themselves when they heard the verdict! Apparently, the sentence still existed in the legislation of the island. A never abolished remnant of Ottoman occupation, where this way of execution was still in use. And mostly reserved for men. Women were generally executed by the ‘more humane’ method of drowning. And generally, public executions had been largely abolished since Chaos had been a touristic destination. But apparently, the international crisis had been spreading since our arrest, and tourism had ceased on Chaos. Many people had lost their jobs, and felt insecure about their personal and collective future. Clearly, a firm merciless execution of a gang of spies and terrorists would be a demonstration of power, that their security was cared for, some revenge against those perceived responsible for the loss of their jobs, and a good public distraction too! Although I had always feared drowning, that would have been a merciful and quick death compared to crucifixion. That takes days! Days of endless public humiliation and endless, hopeless terrible suffering. I had to prepare for it, but there was so little time left!

That evening I was brought back to the Court, strange enough. The judge took out pieces from my interrogation record. Those pieces in which I had claimed to be Aurore d'Artois. He started asking questions about that! Strange questions! He asked me about my past. Afterwards I was locked up again without explanation.

Had someone doubts about my claim? Maybe the solution of a more than twenty year old mystery lay at hand, and was meanwhile about to slip away, through their own acts. Could they face the responsibility that I could take such a secret with me in my grave?

Was there… a little bit of hope, or at least some prospect for postponement of my sentence?

(to be continued)
 
Part 4 – episode 33

TODAY!

Somewhere in Chaos City, in the Diplomat’s Quarter, there is an enclosed space, which is called ‘The Cage’. Surrounded by the outer walls of the quarter and former military arsenal buildings, it was once the location of an Ancient Greek temple. A long time, it was part of the city’s arsenal, but time and earthquakes had leveled the temple during the ages. The Cage is a wrought iron lattice work, fifty feet long, thirty feet wide, and at its cam twenty feet high. It stands on a floor level, four feet higher than the surrounding former temple plaza. On the floor level stand two rows of brick pedestals, two feet high. Each pedestal stands ten feet apart, the rows twelve feet. The pedestals are hollow. In the square hollow fits a wooden post, six feet high. On top of it is a metal reinforced tenon, on which a horizontal beam, fitting in the tenon by a mortise, can be put on.

For decades, The Cage (fully named ‘The Cage of Sighs’), had been a tourist attraction. Visitors not only came to see the remnants of the Doric columns, shattered as indented discs around the square. They also learned that during Ottoman occupation, non-Muslim condemned to death got executed by crucifixion in The Cage for certain crimes. The last time in 1895. The tourist guides did not eschew to mix some propaganda in their tour of the site, emphasizing how barbaric the former rulers had behaved against the local population, and how the Christian liberators had made an end to this cruelty.

Somehow they must revise their guidebooks, since the barbaric cruelty was back on Chaos, this time implemented by the Christian rulers!

Condemned were brought into The Cage by a system of underground spaces, which once were used to keep flammable and explosive ordnance. A wooden stairs and a trapdoor give access from the dungeons (where the condemned are locked up prior to their execution) to the inside of The Cage.

The evening before my execution, I was visited by a French army chaplain. Considering the way he insisted to ‘relieve my conscience, I had the impression he was sent for more than comforting my soul, and that he also had to try to get information about my past!’ But I had nothing to tell him, and he could not comfort me neither, since all my religious belief had gone long ago, after that terrible earthquake. Maybe that day in Laibach, it had touched me for the last time, when I was supposed to kill a man who had just prayed for my family’s souls. Perhaps it had been all ceremony and protocol, then, but yet the intend had touched me. If God exists, then He has taken away my parents and my brothers from me, and delivered me to an overambitious, power greedy uncle. But I kept these thoughts for myself. After all, the chaplain was a nice man who did his job with the best intentions and perhaps only followed orders.

Why were they interested in my past? To bring me back to France and show me up like a trophy? A late revenge for a conspiracy? A demonstration that the King’s justice catches you, no matter when, no matter where you are. Show me up and then ultimately execute me, of course! I would rather prefer to die with my friends, here!

Nevertheless, after the chaplain had left my cell, I collapsed. Would I die? Did I have to die? Would I be brought to death? Was I ready for it? Then calm came back. How long could I stand it? The ultimate moment would be when the first nail would be driven through my wrist. Of course I am not ready for it! But everywhere, in Rambouillet, in Slovenia and here on Chaos, I have been living from one day to another. Now it is all the same. It is an unreal feeling that it will be over within a few days. So unreal, that I can imagine it by no means. Therefore it feels as I can live with the prospect of the execution. Soon, all that will be left will be pain, agony and humiliation. But that will be later! Now is now!

My lonely imprisonment was becoming heavy. I missed a nice chat, I missed being with the girlfriends, I missed a cozy hug. I terribly missed Pavlos. I had not heard anything from him anymore. Where would he be? Would he know what happened to me? Would he know where I am? In that case, would he come and watch me dying?

I always had thought that, at such a moment one would make the balance of a life. Not so! I'm just waiting for them to come and get me. Maybe because I am not ready for it. There is little to look back on, by the way? My whole adult life has been ruled by things I had no control over. Everything looked like chaos. Queen of chaos. Conclusion: there is not much to make balance. So I sit just waiting. I even catch myself at getting a bit of impatient. Totally absurd!

The cell door is opened. A sergeant, an officer and two soldiers come in. Outside there are two more soldiers. All French. They apparently do the dirty work here? The military judge is there too. And the military attorney.
"It's time, Luisa!"

I stand up
“Come here! Turn around”

A soldier shackles my hands behind my back..
“Come with!”
We walk through a maze of corridors. We end up in a larger space, with a wooden stairs leading to a trapdoor. I know where we are! Under The Cage. I have visited these spaces in peacetime.
But then, the judge and the attorney bring me to a small room. The sergeant and the soldiers are ordered to wait outside. Lieutenant d’Artois and the chaplain are there too. I notice something strange in the Lieutenant’s looks. He seems to be lacking some of his… his usual arrogance!?
“Luisa Schneider! We have to talk.”
“Talk? About what?”
“About Aurore d’Artois!”
“What do you mean!?”
“Look at this!”
They show me newspapers. French newspapers, editions from after my arrest. I do not have to read the articles. The headlines and photographs speak for themselves! They strike me with surprise!
“Hein!?”

(to be continued)
 
Part 4 – episode 34

"Coronation of King Robert III in the Cathedral of Reims..!"

“AURORE D’ARTOIS, Our new Queen!”

“Portrait du Dauphin Robert d’Artois, futur Robert IV.”

“La Reine Aurore! Queen Aurore d’Artois! Mais… c’est moi!”
And King Robert III, that is ‘my’ Robert! My ‘husband’ from long ago! No doubt about it. Despite the fact that we are so many years later, I recognize him immediately.
“Indeed, Luisa! A strange twist, isn’t it?” the judge says.
“But what happened?”
“King Jacques has been forced to abdicate. He had lost the trust of the nobility and the army! There has been an election! Robert d’Artois has been elected with full support from both the French and the Iberian nobility!”
“But, what does it all mean?”
“Luisa! Not everybody is happy with what happened in France! Many consider the new king as an opportunistic conspirator, whose claim to the throne is illegal!”
“I do not agree! I have a degree in state governance from the Sorbonne! I have learned there that in France, electing the king by an electorate of nobles, is a legal procedure to appoint the king.”
“If you would be the real Aurore d’Artois, Luisa, the legitimacy of the king’s claims could be questioned!”.”
“Not true, again! Legally, the queen has no status at all! She is only the king’s wife! Nevertheless, who is that… woman!? That…imposter!? Where does she come from?”
“As far as we know, after the Artois conspiracy, she has lived for years in Ireland, as Jasna von Vetcha!”
“Jasna von Vetcha? But that is the real name of Lisa Kellermann, they told me. And Lisa Kellermann is dead since nearly twenty years, I have been told too!”
“Jasna von Vetcha, who used to travel sometimes with a passport naming her.. Luisa Schneider!”
“Wait! What are you suggesting? If the queen is not the real Aurore d’Artois, that could undermine the king’s legitimacy? Right?”
“Right! Luisa!”
“I do not agree, I just said! But one thing still needs to be explained! What are you doing here, Lieutenant d’Artois?”
The lieutenant kept silent.
“On whose side are you?” I asked him (a stupid question actually, here on Chaos).
“Ecoutez…” that’s all he said.
“Oh…I got the picture now! Suddenly, my claim of being Aurore d’Artois would matter for some! Like for you, Lieutenant d’Artois!? Are you implicated in some game here? Do you actually still know whom you really are?”
The lieutenant really looked embarrassed.
“Consider, Luisa,” the judge said, “if you are the real Aurore d’Artois, tell us, prove it! France will be grateful if you would! Help us solve that mystery!”
“One word, and we will postpone your execution!” the attorney added.
“What about the execution of the others?”
“It is too late, Luisa, they are already hanging to their cross. Their agony has started!”
“Get them down again!”
“Impossible! Justice must be done!”
“In that case, they are waiting for me!”
“Are you crazy!? Do you know what is awaiting you, up there!? A horrendous death! If you are whom you claim to be, then you cannot lower yourself to the fate of scum. You are entitled to get a more honorable treatment! For God”s sake! If you really are Aurore d’Artois, then you descend from the world’s oldest and most esteemed royal house! You cannot… that would be preposterous!”

Briefly, my instinct for self-protection urges me to accept the proposal. But knowing that my four friends are already suffering on their cross, makes me cringe. I hope they did not notice.
“I am Luisa Schneider, condemned to death for conspiracy, spying, murder,…. That is all I have to tell you!”
Actually, I can't believe I am saying that myself. But my dislike to their pathetic little conspiracy play is stronger. All that fuss about royal descent has brought me nothing but misery. What has to happen, that should happen.
“Lieutenant d’Artois, talk to her!”

(to be continued)
 
you cannot lower yourself to the fate of scum. You are entitled to get a more honorable treatment!
You hear that, Barb?

Try that line on Tree, next time! :hmmm:
 
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