At the bottom of the long, steep descent, a pair of burly men waited. They had clearly heard the visitors to the dungeon approaching. Both were shirtless, and as round-shouldered and hairy as bears. In the illumination of the light sphere Merritt carried, their white eyes peered out from dark, grimy faces stained by soot from torches. They were clearly surprised to see a woman and suspicious of Merritt.

An oil lamp sitting off to the side on a small, simple plank table provided the only light. It wasn’t much, and so the men, used to the near darkness, squinted in the relatively bright light Merritt was holding. They were as filthy as a pair of moles.

Before the men could speak, Magda did. “You have a woman prisoner, a spy. We’re here to see her.”

The two guards shared a look, surprised that it had been she and not Merritt who had spoken.

“Prisoners don’t get to have visitors,” the first guard said in a gravelly voice.

“I’m not a visitor,” Magda told him. She kept her voice cold and unfriendly. “I am here to question her.”

In ill humor, the man planted his fists on his hips.

“Prisoners don’t generally answer questions, either.” He grinned as he glanced over his shoulder at the second guard. “Unless it’s under torture.”

They both chuckled.

Magda knew that she had to be bold in her bluff if it was to work. She had convinced Merritt to go along with her plan and follow her lead, so he was letting her do the talking. She reasoned that it would be unexpected and thus more convincing coming from her than from a man. Although he had agreed, Merritt stood ready if it didn’t work. Not speaking, resting a palm on the hilt of his ever-present sword, towering just behind her left shoulder, he looked quite forbidding.

Magda leaned toward the grinning man, putting her face close to his, looked him in the eye, and gritted her teeth. “Then I will have to torture the bitch, now won’t I?”

He blinked in surprise. He opened his mouth to say something, but before he could, Magda again spoke first.

“Do you know who I am? Do you have any idea who you are talking to?”

His thick brow drew lower. “Yes, I’m talking to—”

Merritt, off to the side and just behind her, gestured from side to side with his fingertips across his throat, a warning to the man not to say anything to make her angry. It apparently looked convincing, because the man paused and reconsidered what he had been about to say. He poked his tongue out between missing bottom teeth to swipe at his lower lip, unsure what to do.

The second man, picking up on Merritt’s warning, spoke up instead. “I’m afraid that, no, we don’t know who you are. You have us at a disadvantage.”