J
This is for you.
Thankyou.
Glancing around furtively, she proceeded along the corridor, pausing briefly to listen intently for the sounds of her pursuers. Her escape from the cell had been detected within minutes, and the guards were hot on her heels, but those few minutes had given her a reasonable head start on her captors. However, she was already lost in the network of tunnels that riddled the lower levels of the castle. In her desperation, she had resorted to choosing passageways at random in the hope that she might be able to find her way out to the higher levels by luck alone.
Ten minutes later, she was still hopelessly lost. She thought she had shaken off the guards, but the tunnel walls kept hiving her a false sense of distance, and she had nearly ran into one group, barely escaping their clutches. Years of malnutrition and lack of exercise cooped in her cell had reduced her fitness levels, and she was beginning to flag dangerously.
Pausing to catch her breath at an intersection, she noticed that one of the passageways leading away from her was slightly better maintained, and was totally devoid of any of the green moss that covered the walls in mottled patches nearer the cells. With the sound of her pursuers close behind her, voices echoing menacingly, she decided to risk the passageway. Hope renewed slightly, she sprinted headlong into it.
It twisted left and right, until she was completely disorientated and was beginning to despair. She rounded another sharp corner, and she saw the bright light of day ahead of her. Pausing in the shadows, she pondered her next action. Her escape planned hadn’t been formulated past getting out of her cell and fleeing, as she had judged her chances of making it this far as exceptionally slim. She looked out at the assembled masses who where passing back and forth in front of her, and began to formulate a plan.
Maen was sat on an upturned beer barrel, smoking his pipe, a steady rock in the swirling masses of people who were busily hurrying back and forth, laden with goods or herding animals back and forth between the palace and the town nestled in it’s shadow. Many of the peasants were trying to avoid the glares of the palace guards, who were studying the crowd with suspicious eyes, darting from figure to figure. He unconcerned with the guards, as he had been coming here for the past few months now, and the fact that he knew most of them by name helped his passage considerably.
He was considering heading home when he saw a bedraggled figure emerge from one of the passageways, squinting in the bright sunlight. She was dressed in a non-descript tunic, obviously well-worn and old. She had the air of someone trying to remain calm, with shifting eyes trying to absorb as much detail as possible. He watched her meld with the crowd, and vanish from sight amongst the throng.
A couple of seconds later, a group of harassed looking guards burst from the same passageway and began to systematically comb the crowd.
Maen stretched, put away his pipe, and headed towards the palace gates.
She was almost there.
The palace gates loomed oppressively above her, towers of brick work studded with gargoyles and windows that seemed to reach to the very heavens above her. She bought her gaze back down, and inspected her route to freedom. The crowd was flocking towards the main gates, the press of bodies being channelled through the gates, with the occasional person being picked out and being questioned.
Nearly all of the crowd were flashing bits of well-worn parchment at the guards as they passed, and the guards were dutifully checking a few, although not all.
She was being slowly pushed towards the gates by the press of the crowd, and she decided to allow the force of the crowd to push her slowly towards the gates. The last thing she wanted was one of the guards to notice her reluctance and come and question her, especially as she didn’t have any paperwork.
Slowly, she neared the gates, freedom beckoning.
Only ten paces.
Five
Three
“Papers please”
She froze. The request had been directed to her. For a split second, she was tempted to try and make a run for it, one last bid for freedom, but she knew she wouldn’t get very far. She was exhausted, and the guard looked like he could easily catch her in her fatigued condition.
“Didn’t you hear me miss? I asked for your papers”
Smiling sweetly, she turned to the guard.
“I’m sorry, I appear to have lost them.”
“A likely story I’m sure. Step over here please”
To be continued