The Ape Who Guards the Balance - Elizabeth Peters [80]
The door had not been locked or barred. As soon as it opened he knew why.
They hadn’t handled David as considerately as they had him. They must have tossed him in and left him to lie as he fell, because his head was bent at an awkward angle and his legs were twisted. Not even a pile of moldy straw lay between his body and the hard earthen floor, which was littered with ancient animal droppings. They hadn’t stinted on the rope, though, and the dirty gag covered his nose as well as his mouth.
There was a lamp. The guard would have insisted on that.
He had been sitting on the floor with his back against the wall, and he must have been dozing, for he was slow to react. When he rose, Ramses’s stomach twisted. The fellow was as tall as he and twice as broad. His belly rounded the front of his galabeeyah, but not all the weight was fat. And he had a knife.
For a moment they stared at one another in mutual stupefaction. The guard was the first to recover. It wasn’t difficult for Ramses to read his mind; his round sweaty face mirrored every slow-moving idea. No need to call for help against an opponent as wretched-looking as this one. Recapturing the prisoner single-handed would win him praise and reward. He drew his knife from its scabbard and started forward.
Ramses wasn’t thinking fast either, but the options were too obvious to be overlooked. One backward step would take him out the door. There was a bar. By the time the guard broke down the door or summoned help, he would be long gone. It was the only sensible course of action. Unarmed and exhausted, he wouldn’t last ten seconds against a hulking brute like that one. No one would know he had run away. David was unconscious. Or dead.
He launched himself forward and down, at an acute angle that would—he hoped—take him under the blade of the knife. The move caught even him by surprise; his chest hit the floor with a force that knocked the breath out of him, but his hands were already where he wanted them to be, gripping the bare ankles under the ragged hem of the galabeeyah. He yanked, with all the strength he could muster.
It wasn’t much. His right hand gave way, but the left was still functioning, and it was enough to pull the man’s feet out from under him and get his attention off the knife. He sat down with a thud that must have rumbled up his spine into his skull, and his head hit the wall. The blow only stunned him but it gave Ramses time to finish the job. Then he picked up the knife and crawled through the dung and dust to David.
He was alive. As soon as his mouth and nose were uncovered he sucked in a long shuddering breath. Ramses heaved him over and began slashing at the ropes. He had freed David’s hands and arms before he realized that not all the dark stains on David’s shirt were dirt. He breathed out a word even his father seldom employed.
“Ramses?”
“Who else? How badly are you hurt? Can you walk?”
“I’ll give it my best try as soon as you free my ankles.”
“Oh. Right.”
After he had done so Ramses stuck the knife in his belt and bent over David. “Put your arm over my shoulders. We’re on borrowed time as it is; if you can’t walk I’ll carry you.”
“I can stumble at least. Help me up.”
At first he couldn’t even stumble. Ramses had to drag him out the door and across the courtyard to the gate Layla had left open. They weighed about the same, but Ramses could have sworn David had gained ten stone in the past few hours. His lungs were bursting and his knees felt like molasses. He couldn’t keep this up much longer.
Then he heard a shout from the house and discovered he could.