He probably did Saul a favor.

Sandy wrote:I thought it was great, and I liked Saul. It was necessary evil.

Indeed.

Sixty-six

The pit’s population accepted Crazy Saul’s death as either suicide or accidental. After all, who would want or have any need to murder one so helpless and innocuous? And certainly no one mourned his malodorous absence. Yet, for several days afterward, the evil that Bane had perpetrated troubled him, for he had always hated prisoners who preyed upon only those who were weaker than they. Yet whenever the memory agitated him and caused his fingers to twitch, he looked to Talia, and his shame melted away.

As the weeks and months slipped by in one monotonous blur, Talia’s grief for her mother blurred as well, aided by the resilience of youth. The nightmares ceased, and her appetite returned. Her insatiable curiosity of all things was renewed, and she devoured any book that she could read or that Bane read to her. She dogged him relentlessly about exploring the various corridors in the prison, but Bane would not allow it. So instead she enjoyed her time in the stepwell—playing in the water, squealing with delight as Bane chased her up and down the steps, or riding piggyback as Bane galloped about, playing the part of her faithful steed. Sometimes as he sat near the pool with Talia perched upon his shoulders, she would cross her arms upon his head and use him as a pillow, falling asleep there. She still accompanied him to Hans’s cell for his daily workouts, but once in a while—if she was engrossed in a book or playing with her newly-carved toys—she allowed him to leave their cell without her. Such confidence on her part pleased him. Yet sometimes it saddened him as well because he hated the thought of her growing up and becoming more and more independent, as he had with his mother. Independence could lead to her ruin, he feared. For her safety, he needed her to be afraid of everything beyond their cell.

She seemed to grow right before Bane’s watchful eyes. Every few weeks she begged him to mark her growth with a piece of chalk upon the wall of their cell, then she would gaze proudly upon the visual proof of her progress to adulthood. Diligently he kept her hair closely cropped, and he argued privately with her to always wear her shemagh, especially when they were outside their cell. He told her that it was to safeguard her health, to keep away drafts, but she cared not for any sort of logic when the mood struck her to toss back her head cover.

Her personality developed with the same rapid rate as her body, showing stubborn willfulness—though never meanness or spite—whenever she disagreed with his parenting. Her temper, too, showed a change, especially after her mother’s death—she was quicker with outbursts or arguments. Of course, she never stayed angry with him for long, not only because she loved him but because he—as keeper of their key—had the ability to punish her by not allowing her to leave their cell with him. Such a denial of privilege was worse to her than any harsh words he might entertain using against her petulance. With Bane being as volatile as she when challenged, their squabbles often drove Yemi, Abrams, and Greyson—who now occupied Gola’s old space—from their cells with loud, profane complaints.

One of those fights had occurred near the pool when she—seven years old by then—had pulled off her shirt and demanded that he teach her how to swim.

“I don’t know how to swim,” he cajoled, reaching for her discarded garment. “So how could I teach you or anyone else how to swim? Now put your shirt back on. It’s cold.”

“No.”

She struggled to untie the hemp belt at her waist. Trying to contain his alarm at her intent, Bane grabbed for her, but she sidestepped out of reach, and he was forced to get to his feet. At that, she abandoned her struggle with the belt and leapt into the pool. Instantly Bane jumped in after her, their commotion drawing the ire of those inmates closest to them whom they splashed.

“Go ahead and drown the little rat,” Greyson called from the far side of the pool. “Less noise around here then.”

Talia’s leap had completely submerged her, and she came up coughing and floundering, but the pool was shallow enough for her to stand and keep her head above the surface. She had time only to swipe the water from her eyes before Bane snatched her up and dragged her, kicking and screaming, to the nearest steps.

“Lemme go! I want to swim.”

He tossed her over his shoulder. “The pool isn’t for swimming,” he scolded, absorbing her childish blows against his back. “How many times must I tell you that? Now you’ve gotten us both wet.”

“Put me down!”

He maintained his vice-like hold upon her as he retrieved her shirt and started back to their cell.

“I don’t wanna go back. Let me stay. Please. I’ll be good.”

“Where have I heard that before?”

Several prisoners taunted him and his predicament as nursemaid to an unmanageable ward as he climbed out of the stepwell. But he ignored the familiar derision and harsh laughter, hiding the fear that had set his heart hammering ever since Talia had flung off her shirt. Her punishing blows had ceased the minute he started upward, and her conversion to contrition continued with implorations to return to the pool and promises that she would behave.

“Don’t even start,” he warned when she began to conjure up the tears that had worked so often in the past.

“Please, Ba-ba.”

“That’s not going to work either,” he scolded her nickname tactic. “You’re going to dry off in our cell, and I’m not going to hear any more talk of swimming ever again. Understand?”

She sniffed, all fight drained from her now as she rested her head on his shoulder.

Once in the privacy of their cell—all of their neighbors were gone—Bane used one of their blankets to towel off her upper body before putting her shirt back on. It was over-sized and long enough to reach nearly to her knees. He removed her soaking pants and shoes, then wrapped her in Melisande’s blanket and sat her on their cot. Wringing the water from the articles as best he could, he then hung them upon the bars of their cell. He did the same with his own pants then replaced them with his dry sarong.

“We’re running low on charcoal,” he said with his same displeased tone. “And now we must waste some of it to get you warm here in the middle of the day.”

“I’m not cold,” she said, though her chattering teeth betrayed her lie.

He raised a disappointed eyebrow at her, and she shrank with shame.

“I’m sorry, Bane,” she murmured, staring at the floor.

When he was finished at the brazier, he came to sit next to her. Her head was still down, and a couple of genuine tears dripped from her chin to the blanket. With a frown, he put an arm around her, never able to stay angry at her for more than a few minutes, understanding all too well the boredom and frustration of being a child in the pit.

“Don’t cry, little mouse. It’s all right.” He retrieved her shemagh from where it lay on the cot and draped it around her neck, tucking it close to her chilled skin. “Do you know why I don’t want you to play in the pool?”

“Because it’s cold.”

“Yes, well, there is that.” He lowered his voice and spoke close, his eyes always checking the corridor. “But don’t you remember what your mother and I told you about taking off your clothes in front of others?”

“But I didn’t take my clothes off; just my shirt.”

He sighed in exasperation. “We can’t let the others know that you are physically different from them, remember? Getting your pants wet…well, it makes your clothes cling to you, doesn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“And because of that some might be able to tell that you’re different…down there, I mean. Do you see what I mean?”

Talia frowned. “I guess so.”

“We can’t let them know. They would try to hurt you like they did your mother.”

“Why?”

“I’ve told you why; they are bad men.”

“Hans isn’t a bad man.”

“I’m not talking about Hans. Now don’t argue with me on this. Just promise me that you won’t jump in the pool again.”

Her lips twisted. “I promise.”

Bane kissed her head. “Thank you.” He stood. “Now…I’m going to Hans’s cell to work out.” When she started to get up, he said, “No, not you. You must stay here.”

“But why?”

He gave her a stern look. “Whose teeth are chattering from disobeying me?”

She hung her head.

“I want you to sit on the mat in front of the brazier and dry off. Put that charcoal to good use. And keep that blanket tight around you. I’ll be back in an hour.”


###


When Bane returned to his cell, he found Talia still in front of the glowing brazier, a large book open in her lap. Stepping inside, he recognized the volume by its size: his anatomy book. Having it in her possession surprised him, for he kept it on the top of their bookshelf, out of Talia’s reach. But then he noticed that she had dragged their stool to the shelf; she must have climbed the rest of the way.

She looked over her shoulder at him and smiled, pointing at the pages. “Look, Bane! I found a picture of someone like me.”

Puzzled, he crouched next to her, and when he saw the illustrations of female genitalia, a small gasp escaped him, and he quickly swiped the book from her.

“Bane! Give it back.”

He returned the textbook to the shelf and dragged the stool away.

“Did you see the picture? It was like me—”

Harshly shushing her, Bane rushed back to her and clamped a hand over her mouth.

“What?” she protested against his palm while his gazed darted around them.

He put a finger to his lips before releasing her.

Talia whispered, “What’s wrong?”

“You must not speak of those pictures.”

“Why not? They looked like me. I mean—”

Bane’s hand covered her mouth again. “I know what you mean.”

She struggled to dislodge him.

“Whisper,” he said.

When she nodded, he freed her and sat next to her on the bamboo mat.

Talia’s forehead furrowed. “Those pictures,” she said thoughtfully. “It said they’re of a woman.” Her long lashes lifted like tiny dark veils as she raised her confused gaze to him. “She was like me…down there. But…I’m a boy.”

Bane put his arm around her to draw her close, his attention hard upon the coals in the brazier, as if he could find the answer to his predicament there among the sizzling embers.

“If I’m a boy, why don’t I look like the other picture, the one of a man? Will I change when I get older? Is that what happens?”

“No, sweetheart,” he said, desperately struggling for a way to deny what was already apparent to her. He could not hide the books nor the truth forever, yet he had hoped for more time… Finally he met Talia’s gaze, and he remembered Melisande despairing over their deception. Surely she would understand if he now explained the truth of the matter to her daughter. But could a child keep such a secret?

With her mother’s blanket still wrapped about her, Talia crawled into Bane’s lap, cleverly knowing that such a gesture of trust and love would crumble his defenses. A small hand escaped the blanket’s folds and gently touched his lips, as if such a caress could impel an explanation from him.

“Tell me what happens, Bane.”

“You will change,” he said at last. “But not the way you think.” Again he glanced along the corridor to ensure their solitude. “You won’t change into a man, though; you will change into a woman…from a girl to a woman.”

“A girl? What do you mean?”

“I mean you have a secret, a secret that only I and the doctor knows about…as did your mother.”

“What secret?”

He bent even closer to her ear. “Do you know why the other prisoners attacked your mother?”

“Because they’re bad men.”

“Yes, but…they attacked her specifically because she was a woman.”

“Because she was different?”

“Yes, different than them…in all things, but mainly because she was a woman, just like you will be one day. And that’s why we’ve kept this secret from you, from everyone—to protect you, to keep you safe, to fool the bad men so they wouldn’t hurt you, too.” He watched the parade of confusion march across her large eyes. “You are a girl…not a boy.” When she gasped, he quickly put a finger to her lips. “It has been a secret all these years, and that’s how it must be always, for as long as you are here in this prison. Do you understand?”

She continued to stare up at him, and he was relieved to see that she was not angry with him for misleading her. “I’m a girl?” she whispered.

“Yes. A beautiful girl…just like your mother.”

Another gasp escaped her. “Just like Mama…” He could tell by her frown that she was thinking back, no doubt remembering the times she had seen her mother’s body, times when she had been too young to make the correlation between her parent’s sex and her own. “But why did the bad men hurt Mama just because she was a woman? Why don’t they like women? You’re a man, and you never hurt Mama…or me.”

Well, Bane considered, best to tell her all, to get it over with altogether at once. She very well might not understand everything, but at least she would know that he no longer kept anything from her.

“Let me get the book again,” he said, encouraging her to return to the mat. Once he retrieved the anatomy book, he sat beside her and opened the pages to illustrate his explanation. Uncomfortable, he cleared his throat, unwittingly remembering his long-standing desire for her mother. Sometimes—considering the way she had died—memories of those urges made him feel ashamed.

“Before your mother came here, she married your father, Henri Ducard, because they loved each other very much.”

“I know,” she said with a hint of impatience. “Mama told me all about him. She named me after Papa.”

“Well, when two people love each other as much as your parents did, they…they…well, they…they have intercourse and that’s what makes babies like you.” Talia’s frown deepened, so he hurried onward, pointing to the illustration of a man’s anatomy. “This is like…your father.”

“Like you,” she said with a smile that turned his face and even his ears crimson. He was unsure which made him squirm more, the fact that she was familiar with his genitals or that she seemed more interested in him than her father.

“And this…is like your mother.”

Some of the confusion lifted as she in turn pointed at the pictures, “This is like you…a man, and this is like me…a woman.”

To consider Talia as a sexually mature woman gave Bane pause, unexpectedly flustered him. He gently reminded her to whisper, using the moment to recover. “Yes…well, as I was saying, a man and a woman have intercourse, which—”

“What’s intercourse? Is there a picture?” She flipped back a few pages.

“Not in here, no.” He inwardly cursed. Why did he have to be the one to explain all this? After all, he certainly was no expert, a twenty-two-year-old virgin—a fact often used by other prisoners to mock him, men like Greyson who said he would die here that way. Yet another reminder of all the things he had not experienced in life, as others his age had beyond this pit.

Using the book’s illustrations, he did his best—in the briefest possible way—to explain the sex act to Talia.

“That’s how your mother had you…because your father made love to her; that’s what some people call having sex. But, to some men, having sex doesn’t have anything to do with love. It’s about satisfying their base needs; it’s about power and hate; it’s about hurting someone.”

Talia had remained quiet throughout his elucidation, her expression thoughtful as she struggled to understand. When he said these last words, fear stole some of the color from her cheeks. “That’s what the bad men did to Mama?” she asked in a small voice.

He closed the book, feeling suddenly very cold despite the brazier. “Yes.”

Setting the textbook aside, he drew her back into his lap and wrapped his arms around her. She, too, felt chilled. He kissed the top of her head then the edge of Melisande’s blanket before he wrapped it tighter around her.

“Is that what they will do to me?” she anxiously asked.

“Not if we keep your secret. The others must always think you are a boy; you must remain Henri for as long as you’re here.”

She hesitated a moment before looking up with sudden realization. “Henri is a boy’s name…Papa’s name.”

“Yes; that’s the name your mother chose to help keep you safe.”

“But if I’m really a girl…what’s my girl name? Did Mama give me a girl name, too? A secret name?”

His lips pressed together as he frowned and looked into Yemi’s cell…Melisande’s cell, remembered that day long ago when Melisande had revealed Talia’s name. How he missed their private talks together…

“Bane?”

“Yes…she told me your real name. I’m the only one who knows it; not even Doctor Assad knows. We never told him…to be safe.”

Talia tugged at his shirt to draw his attention back to her. Eagerly she asked, “What is it?”

He considered her bright eyes, the intrigue there, the wonder and curiosity about her true identity. His inherent cautiousness warned him against revealing the name. What would Melisande do if she were here in his place with her child staring up at her, waiting with bated breath?

“Tell me, Bane,” Talia whispered. “Please.”

He thought of his own birth name, nearly lost from memory now. If he ever left this place, would he reclaim it? If he did, if he relegated Bane to this pit, would that also bring back his innocence and erase all that he had done here? If he was ever to meet his father, which name would he choose to introduce himself?

“Bane, tell me my name.”

Talia’s words drew him back from his brief reverie.

“Perhaps it would be better if I waited until we’re free of this place. It’s safer if you only know Henri.”

“No,” she wheedled. “Tell me. I promise I won’t ever say it. Please.” She tugged again at his shirt. “Tell me.”

Bane frowned again, struggled. He had come this far; to go no further would be cruel and only lead to badgering on her part, and that alone could prove ruinous if heard by other ears.

Talia had gotten to her feet and now stood between his legs, close. She took his face in her hands, their noses touching. “Please, Ba-ba.”

His defenses crumbled, and he momentarily closed his eyes in defeat. When he opened them, he pulled her back into his embrace, his lips close to her ear. “Talia,” he murmured. “Your mother named you Talia.”

From Talias POV this must be the biggest mindfuck ever. How old is she precisely, now?

TehBatGetsBraked wrote:From Talias POV this must be the biggest mindfuck ever. How old is she precisely, now?

One of those fights had occurred near the pool when she—seven years old by then—had pulled off her shirt and demanded that he teach her how to swim.

^^^You read too fast, Melonsalad.

I totally agree with you about the mindfuck. No doubt it contributes to her propensity for using men later in life.

I never imagined we'd get this far into Hen---Talia's psyche.

By the way, I'm going to start a story of relentless pursuit, betrayal and revenge that came in the mail from Amazon tonight, rather than wait like I had said. Pretty excited.

Oh my...poor Talia:( I think Bane handled it as best as he could. I feel bad for the both of them:( I loved how you put that he raised his eyebrow and Talia looked down in shame... ha.. all I could think about was Hardy's expressive eyebrows... What is Bane going to do when another woman shows him attention other than Talia...how is he going to react to that once he gets out? if he gets out...

Sandy wrote:By the way, I'm going to start a story of relentless pursuit, betrayal and revenge that came in the mail from Amazon tonight, rather than wait like I had said. Pretty excited.

Thanks! I think you will find it to be a quick read.

Queen of Hearts wrote:Oh my...poor Talia:( I think Bane handled it as best as he could. I feel bad for the both of them:( I loved how you put that he raised his eyebrow and Talia looked down in shame... ha.. all I could think about was Hardy's expressive eyebrows... What is Bane going to do when another woman shows him attention other than Talia...how is he going to react to that once he gets out? if he gets out...

I know...I thought he did a good job, all things considered. Poor dude has a lot of stress to deal with. Bad enough for him there before Talia, but now having to do everything with her welfare in mind adds to the burden.

Baniac wrote:

Sandy wrote:By the way, I'm going to start a story of relentless pursuit, betrayal and revenge that came in the mail from Amazon tonight, rather than wait like I had said. Pretty excited.

Thanks! I think you will find it to be a quick read.


It is still on my list Baniac! I PROMISE!!!

Queen of Hearts wrote:

Sandy wrote:By the way, I'm going to start a story of relentless pursuit, betrayal and revenge that came in the mail from Amazon tonight, rather than wait like I had said. Pretty excited.

It is still on my list Baniac! I PROMISE!!!

No problem. Whenever, whatever, my dear.