Ryu watched
Daman’s health deteriorate as his addiction to the candle smoke increased. A
covert perusal of the Chief of Security’s room revealed several boxes of the
candles. Ryu replaced them with plain wax candles that he had colored to match
the tainted ones expecting a total breakdown when the candles had no effect. A
small thing to undermined Korat’s hierarchy.
Now Daman stood
grasping the doorframe of Ryu’s room. His eyes looked huge in his pallid sweat
soaked face. Daman’s weight loss had left him gaunt and lack of sleep left deep
bruises under his eyes.
“Sir, can I help
you?” Ryu asked the man.
“Come with me to
the dungeons,” his voice rasped
“You are ill sir,
you should be in bed.”
“It is unsafe.”
His eyes darted up and down the hall. “There are those who would take advantage
of my weakened state.”
“I will come,
sir,” Ryu could see the man was barely keeping himself standing as he swayed
and leaned his head against the doorframe.
They walked as
Daman kept one hand trailing the wall. They stopped infrequently as the sick
man clutched both arms across his stomach.
“Sir, what can I
do?” Ryu would asked as he watched the pain etch itself across the Chief’s
face.
“It will pass. I
will conquer this,” he grunted.
They made slow
progress down to the guard room of the dungeons. Daman pulled a key off the
wall and walked down the dim passageway lined with cells. He used the key to
open a cell and then stepped inside.
A
shudder wracked his body and then he turned to face the young man.
“You
alone will know of my true whereabouts. I have left orders on my desk you will
follow to the letter.”
He
swung the door closed.
“Lock
the door and hand me the key through the grill.”
“But
sir there is no way to unlock the door from inside the cell.”
“Do
it!” Daman rasped.
“I
don’t have a good feeling about this, sir.” Ryu turned the key, pulled it from
the lock and handed it through the grill.
“Come
back in week, if I live I will give you the key to open the door if I die this
will be my tomb. Now go away!”
“Yes,
sir.” Ryu heard a muffled thud and assumed that Daman’s legs had finally given
out.
So
Daman thought to purge the demon. Ryu farely skipped up the stairs Damon’s fate
securely in his hands and an open field to wreak havoc on the Empire. He had a
week perhaps longer and the list was endless of the mischief the rebellion
could accomplish.
Ryu
read the papers on Damon’s desk. He destroyed the page with the official story
to explain Damon absence over the next week. He slightly altered orders for
rations to recruits newly acquired at the last tribute. He wrote his own order
for the care of the new prisoner in the dungeon. There was a chance Damon would
get another guard to release him after a few days so everything had to be
explainable, but so much could be done in the next week.
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