There really was a tiny fraction of Alexandre Esquerra’s mind, buried for decisionmaking but put out front whenever he needed to interact with people, that truly believed that if you obeyed Cheliax and were loyal and grateful and worshiped Asmodeus, you could live a good life. That little bit is burning, now, withering and smoking in the furnace of his rage, and he is not sure he will ever be able to recover it.

His arms are chained to the wall. There’s a great deal of give in them; he can move his arms almost freely - reach out a hand almost his arm's full length, though that’s nowhere near enough to reach the small table with the branding iron and knife-block and thumbscrews, or the fire blazing merrily next to it. (It is, very precisely, almost enough give to cast spells, but not quite.) He can’t take off the gag, but that’s because it’s tied behind the back of his head, where he’d need very precise handwork to get it off instead of the kind of handwork you can do with shackles around your wrists. It’s a very carefully designed chain, to give him the illusion of hope, and then exploit it, and he cannot comprehend why.

“There had better be an explanation for this.” That part of his mind is there, too had gotten him whipped several times; by his father, by his teachers, by his classmates. The most it had ever done had been to shift his mindset, occasionally, into “There will be an explanation for this.” But given that Alexandre has not, in fact, done anything - has not disrespected his teachers, has not violated school rules, has been loyal in every way to Asmodeus - he cannot possibly see why he is chained, to the wall, in a dungeon.

Asmodeus, if you can hear me, whatever damned traitor is doing this is breaking your tools. What smith lets His work be marred by another man?