Chapter 16 #2
“Perhaps I can get you out tonight,” she said. “I could break the fetters on your ankles, knock out the guard at the door and run before anyone could stop us. We’d reach the river where the boat is waiting…” She trailed off as Ankhu shook his head, slowly, sadly.
“We cannot, Raetawy. You know this. What of Tamerit? Would you leave her alone in the palace to face interrogation? To face death? And what of the other prisoners? How could I live, knowing that I should have perished with them?”
Rae gritted her teeth. “Fine. Then I’ll find another way.”
“No.” Her father’s expression was resolute.
He seized her shoulder. “There is no way out. You cannot keep me safe; you should never have made that promise. You need to leave while you still can. None of this is your fault, do you understand? I thank Ra that I got to see you one last time, but it is not your responsibility to save me.”
He leaned back against the wall, his energy draining before her eyes.
“I may be hobbled like a donkey, but my ears work just fine. I have heard the guards speak of the king’s cursing ritual.
I know we are not long for this world, and I have made peace with my fate.
I was already given a second chance at life when I survived the war.
It is enough to have lived as long as I have, and to have had the opportunity to raise a woman like you. ”
His eyes shone in the lamplight. “I should never have forbade you from fighting for our freedom. That was wrong. But you must give up this madness. Leave now and return to Sakesh. Fight for our city, Rae. Fight the war that still has a chance of being won. Those of us here…we’re already lost.”
The heat of fury rose in Rae’s breast. “As long as there is breath in your lungs, you are not lost.”
Ankhu pressed his lips into a thin line. “Raetawy, please.”
“I left others to defend the city, Father. Good men and women who work for the Low Khetaran cause. Say what you will, I will not allow you and our kin to perish here undefended. We must make a stand, before Ra and the pharaoh and everyone. I would rather die fighting for your right to live than to live with the knowledge that I walked away. Say what you will, I am not leaving without you.”
Ankhu nodded, his lip trembling. He stroked her hair, as he had when she was a little girl. “I am so proud of you,” he said fiercely. “So proud.”
It took every ounce of Rae’s willpower to rise to her feet. To let go of his hand. But she’d already been gone too long. The guard would soon return to his post, and then Ra only knew how she would get back to her chambers.
“Tell the others to be ready at any moment,” she told her father. “I don’t yet know when or how, but we will come for you. Listen for the call of the nightjar. When you hear its song, know that freedom is at hand.”
Excited murmurs floated up from the shadows around them. The other prisoners had been listening, though she couldn’t see them. She only had eyes for her father, the brightest sun in her sky.
Ankhu studied Rae’s face as if it were the last time he’d see it. “We’ll be ready.”
***
Rae was quietly climbing the stairs to the main level when she heard a grunt from above, followed by the clatter of metal against the stone floor.
She paused. The guard had indeed returned to his post, and apparently someone else was fighting with him. But who? No one knew she was there besides Tamerit.
Rae’s heart began to race. No, she wouldn’t…
At the top of the stairs, Rae pressed herself against the wall and peeked out into the torchlit hall.
Two men were grappling outside the stairwell, both bent at the waist and locked in a battle for dominance, their arms gripping each other, turning around and around in a dangerous dance.
One was the big guard. The other was a younger, leaner man Rae had never seen before.
He wore only a bloodstained loincloth and was covered in nasty cuts, the wounds placed as if to cause the greatest suffering.
He’s been tortured. Rae remembered the room with the wooden post, the dried blood, the cut rope. She hadn’t checked every corner of that room. Had he been hiding there, waiting to escape?
The big guard bore down on the smaller man, forcing him to one knee. “Not so strong now, eh, Femi?” the guard grunted. “Did you really think you’d get out of here alive?”
The man called Femi didn’t reply. Instead, he drove his shoulders into the big man’s hips while cinching his legs together. The guard toppled over sideways, his face hitting the ground with a crack.
That move looked familiar. Two! Rae thought with a smile.
But the fight wasn’t over. Femi kept the guard pinned and crawled up the big man’s body to a mounted position. As soon as he sat up, however, the guard thrust his fist straight into a fresh wound below Femi’s ribs. On impact, the smaller man’s eyes rolled up into his head, and he collapsed.
The guard shoved him off and stood, chuckling as he watched Femi’s feeble attempts to move. The big man wiped his bloody mouth with a knuckle and spat a gob of pink saliva onto Femi’s face.
Femi flinched, still struggling to rise.
The guard bent to retrieve his khopesh from the floor.
Then he turned back to Femi, who’d managed to prop himself on an elbow and was pressing his other hand to his side, trying to stanch the blood flowing from his reopened wound.
The guard nonchalantly flipped the weapon so that the blade was pointed down and stood over the fallen man.
With the guard’s back to her, Rae had the perfect opening to sneak past the men toward the maidservants’ chambers. Creeping out from the shadows of the stairwell, she pressed her back against the wall and began to shuffle by them, working hard not to make a sound.
The guard didn’t notice her.
Femi did.
His eyes widened, and they sized each other up in an instant.
Rae froze, fearing he would expose her, use her as a distraction to escape the same way she was using him. Instead, he tipped his chin toward the corridor ahead, as if to say, Run. Now. While you still can.
Then the guard kicked Femi in the stomach.
He gasped but didn’t cry out.
“To think you were one of us!” the guard said, shaking his head. “Now look at you! Pitiful. But what more can you expect from the princess’s little whore?”
Rae stopped mid-step, her hands clenching into fists.
She knew she should run and leave the High Khetaran to his fate. His troubles were none of her business. She had her own battles to fight. Why should she risk it all for a stranger?
“Damn it all,” she whispered, then turned and took a running leap onto the guard’s back.
The big man barely had time to register the new attacker before Rae laced her arm around his throat.
He made a startled choking sound as her arm tightened.
He stumbled around like a drunkard, scrabbling at her arm with his fingernails.
Then he fell backward, crushing Rae against the wall.
She felt her ribs buckle, but she didn’t let go.
The guard gurgled and then slumped to the ground.
Rae fell with him, trapped between his huge limp body and the wall. Gasping, she released her grip and tried to shove the guard off her, but to no avail.
Meanwhile, Femi staggered to his feet and stared at her in amazement.
“A little help?” she wheezed.
He darted to Rae’s aid, dragging the guard aside and freeing her. Then they worked together to prop him up next to the stairwell, making it look as if he’d simply fallen asleep on the job.
That done, they stood panting and giving each other appraising looks.
“Who are you?” they asked in unison.
“You first,” Rae said.
“You heard my name,” Femi replied. He was pale and still bleeding, but his expression didn’t betray any pain. “I’m a—well, I was a palace guard.”
“Why were they torturing you?”
Femi licked his lips. “I was protecting someone.”
The princess’s little whore, Rae recalled.
So, this Femi was in league with Princess Sitamun.
Tam had shared the rumors about the princess’s disappearance, how people were saying that she ran away because the king intended to marry her, and that she was hiding from her brother somewhere in the kingdom.
Meryamun was apparently quite keen to conceal the truth, but the palace was far from a watertight vessel. Secrets always found a way to leak out.
If Femi was the princess’s ally, perhaps he could also be hers.
“Your turn,” Femi prodded. “What’s your name?”
“Raetawy,” she said, distracted by her whirling thoughts.
She cursed herself. Fool! You’re supposed to give him your alias!
“Well, Raetawy,” Femi said, his words slurring slightly. “I have no idea what you were doing underground, but I appreciate your help.” For all his show of courage, Femi’s blood loss was clearly affecting him.
“Don’t mention it,” Rae replied. She knew she should head back to the maidservants’ chambers and avoid additional conversation, but leaving Femi in his weakened state didn’t sit right with her.
Besides, there’s no rush to get back now.
Tam is covering for me. I could take the opportunity to go to the riverbank and talk to Omari and the others about what I’ve learned.
“I expect you’ll be fleeing the palace now, yes? ” she asked Femi.
He nodded. “I’d best go quickly. There’ll be a change of guard soon, and when they find him like this, there’ll be a search. I know a back way…” He started toward the corridor leading to the main hall, but he stumbled after only a few steps.
Rae ducked under his arm and wrapped her own around his shoulders to keep him from falling. “That sounds like a fine plan. But you’re naked and bleeding, so maybe we grab you a tunic and find this back way together.”
With effort, Femi turned to look up at her, his head lolling, his eyes unfocused. “You’re very tall,” he said vaguely, “has anyone ever told you that?”
Rae sighed and dragged him toward the main hall. “You know what, Femi? You’re the first.”
***