The heavy door swung open, and Owain emerged from the cell, his hot breath producing small clouds of mist in the frigid air of the dungeon corridor. His tunic, the fine linen one he'd worn to breakfast that morning, was no longer fine at all. Dark crimson stains spread across the fabric in abstract patterns, some still wet enough to gleam in the torchlight, others already drying to a rust-brown crust.
More blood speckled his face and throat, a fine spray of droplets that he hadn't bothered to avoid, and his hands were painted red from knuckles to wrists where the brass rings had turned what would have been a simple beating into an exceptionally bloody affair.
