The plan entered her final part. While in the kitchen, Diana made a little piece of dough and then gave it to Gunnora. It was her role to print the shape of the key on the piece of dough so the men in the blacksmith station could make an identical copy of it.
After some persuasion from Diana to Gunnora to try to gain the demonic commander again. Gunnora had to get help with the shape of the key but not before blinding the commander with both wine and flirting.
After 2 days, protector Sebastian managed to give Maria the forged key during lunchtime who subsequently gave it to Diana, to hide it in a secret pocket in her clothes later on.
While the servants would use the forged key, the men would use the forged lockpick.
However, there was a problem. An inspection point just before the prison cell, made for men only, was just the first problem in escaping the castle.
Diana knew that and tried to address the problem with Sebastian. But He assured her that he had a plan to avoid being caught. He never told her what it was though.
While the girls were escorted to their dirty room, Diana heard shouting and guards running toward the inspection point. Their escorting guards themselves ran towards the same place to examine the commotion.
The curious girls took a peek at what was happening, they saw two prisoners fighting and exchanging punches. The guards were busy with the enraged men, and so was Diana until she caught a glimpse of Sebastian winking with his left eye at her.
"A diversion, smart" she whispered to herself
After the fight, the two men were taken into custody at the lower dungeon, with a promise of freedom very soon. Sebastian along with its important tool passed through the point safely.
Later that night
E-day
Servants quarter
The nervous 21 servants including Diana and Gunnora regrouped in a circle around each other to discuss the strategy one last time. Diana cleared her throat:
"Alright, this is the day we demand freedom from these dogs! so here is how it will go." She took a deep breath before continuing.
"I will ask the only guard in front of our steel door to escort me to the toilets (which were at the end of the same floor). While I am out there with the guard, open the door and regroup at the prisoner's quarter on the floor above. They should have taken care of the guards for you..."
"What about you?" Gunnora interrupted her.
"I will take care of that guard for you"
"No way. Let me do this! They trust me more. And I dare say that he could take a peek" Gunnora winked with a mischievous smile
"With all due respect, your mind is as dirty as your plan. You have to reconsider your approach from this point on. Remember You are the oldest and you must lead from now on"
She shook her head in denial. "Isn't this your plan, what if you failed?"
"Let me alone carry this burden"
The girls exchanged looks, silently but they knew that someone must take a risk in this part of the plan.
"Anyway, as I was saying find the prisoners and stick to them all the time they will tell you what they will do after that" she finished
The crowd dispersed...
Hearts pounding like the marching of an army...
Fear is among them. Hope is more dominant than ever. It was them or their kidnappers.
And so according to plan, Diana approached the steel door to call for the guard. She was about to call him when Maria's hand touched her back. "we can manage, but please take care of yourself, ", Maria ended with an encouraging warm hug.
While Diana was returning the hug, she eyed the other girls' faces who looked at her with high gratitude, their lives were in debt to hers.
Diana turned around to face the steel door "Hey, call of nature".
The guard blew air from his mouth.
"Why don't they give this dirty work to someone else" he mumbled under his breath. The grouchy guard escorted her to the toilets and waited outside for her to finish, the same thing every day.
She wasn't surprised when the unbearable smell rushed to the girl's nose as usual, giving her the feeling of puking. She was disgusted, barely resisting the feeling to focus on her mission.
The toilet room was just a hallway with 3 corresponding doors on the right. each door held a garderobe (a pit used as a toilet in castles during the medieval era) behind each door.
The girl looked behind her at the man. His back was facing her, as planned. She opened one of the doors and closed it again without entering, deceiving the man. Her motive was simple.
Kill the guard...
She slowly got her dagger to her right hand while scanning the man. His head was her most valuable target. however, the man was taller, and more equipped and his male body was stronger and accustomed to killing people more often while Diana merely scratched a man's armour in the past and she was shaking afterwards. But now she had a goal and justice to serve. She changed from back then...
She unhurriedly approached the man with her dagger in hand pointed towards her target. The tension was plaguing her body, her legs merely produced sound while moving, and she was breathing slowly, slower than her lungs could bear.
She knew that and so her silent dance started. She used the tip of her legs, sneaking her way towards the intended stealth kill. She was careful not to make any sound as her foot touched the dirty ponds of water all over the area.
She bolted at the man. Although her Approach was as quiet as a night, the last part was like a predator attack.
Boisterous
The man parried the dagger easily. He caught the attacking girl's hand holding the dagger and twisted it painfully to drop her own weapon, and finally, he kicked her belly with his armoured knee.
The girl dropped to the dirty ground, clutching her hurt stomach and moaning from pain.
"Why, you little sneaky" the man laughed before delivering a boot to her face, causing blood to fly from the poor injured girl's lips.
"I wonder how did you got that little knife of yours. Meh, oh well. Guess it won't change the outcome"
Diana couldn't support herself anymore. She just surrendered to the agonizing pain all around her body, and her dagger has been kicked backwards out of the toilet's room. She can't scream unless she wants to attract more guards who would certainly investigate.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
"Any last words, before I torment your cat face," the man said with a sarcastic tone as he brought his sword from its place ready to stab the girl to death.
Instinctively, the girl tried to crawl on her stomach away from the walls of the room, far from her future killer. While her hair to the wall, her swollen face bears heavy signs of fear, eyes filled with untalkable sadness.
She remembered her father. Poor man. She really hoped to bring him back from his despair abyss or at least see him one last time, before she left the world of the living. The tears began to group on her cheeks. Failing to ignore the hulking figure of the mocking man in front of her, she closed her eyes accepting her death without much struggle...
"DIANA!"...
that voice...
She opened her eyes, to see protector Sebastian's arms around the guard's head. He must have ambushed him from behind. The guard was swinging his deadly sword in an attempt to hit the former protector.
"Get out of here now!". He shouted
The traumatized girl was still reeling, her brain was still accommodating that she was given a second chance to live. She ran to the door of the room, but not before meeting a swing of the same sword. She dodged it by a length of a hair. Literally. The sword brushed her hair cutting some hair scraps.
After escaping the deadly swing, the girl's eye met her small dagger again outside in the hallway. Without hesitation, she took it and turned around to take part in the battle. The guard took some steps back and slammed the back of Sebastian to the edge of one of the three doors, breaking his enemy's grab around his neck.
The protector's back was hurt but the battle continued as the guard with a roar turned around and swung his sword toward Sebastian's head. The sword only met the wooden door smashing the wood pieces everywhere.
"AAAAAAAHHHH!"
The man screamed something entered his left thigh from behind. He fell on one knee and weakly swung his sword again at Diana. She jumped back to evade it, So as not to get her stomach another wound. Sebastian took advantage of the diversion. He jumped on the guard from the back knocking him over to the ground, slamming his cheek to the floor while he overwhelmed the guard with a knee to it back. He pulled the bloody dagger from the damaged leg. But before he delivered a stab, the guard gave him a staggering elbow punch and rolled himself over. The guard was now over Sebastian with both men grabbing the dagger pointed towards Sebastian's lungs.
The protector's hand began to shake as it desperately resists the blade from sinking into his ribs. The anxious girl was standing in fear, her mouth shaking from confusion, not knowing what to do until she saw it on the ground...
She rushed to pick it up, it was so heavy that she hardly found a way to raise it using fill powered 2 hands, seeing the men fighting each other, not giving her any attention, she made her move. She came closer dragging it, the guard finally noticed it in her small hands with terror and panic in his evil eyes.
"He left his sword behind!"
The girl roared like an eagle on its prey. She swung the sword towards his head digging the air between, like a lightning bolt. She missed his head but not his neck. The blood exploded from the slit throat of the man that he left the dagger to stop the deadly bleeding with his hands, as he falls on his back choking on his own blood. It wasn't too long before the man had a slow painful death.
She was breathing heavily, sweat all over her face, exhaustion taking its toll on her body and mind, and her stomach still hurt. But most of all she was not shaking.
She was strangely happy and never felt a drop of regret that she just committed a murder. ending a human life. she changed ...only for the sake of her father. The man who raised her as the angel of mercy and beauty didn't know that his only daughter had become an Angel of death and blood.
How would he feel about her now? Would he be happy that his daughter was brave or would he be disgusted and frightened of how his blonde daughter changed to become nothing less than a killer? What would his face express if he was watching her right now with a sword soaked with someone else blood?
"Woah, I could see the old Richard in you, girl" chuckled Sebastian while he was still lying on the ground, recovering from the battle. the girl laughed softly with a forced smile. "well, come on, tell that to him personally" she offered him her hand. the man refused and stood on his own.
The two left towards the second floor and just like planned, the prisoners broke free using the lockpick and disposed of the guards without a problem. the servants were there too, a bit scared but alive. On seeing her, Maria rushed to hug the girl again. "What does that monster have done to your face?!"
"it doesn't matter now, he is dead," she said coldly. "go with the men, I still need to save my father"
"I am not leaving you, girl, and don't try to argue with that"
"and so am I, I still want to check the old man" said Sebastian supporting and sarcastic about it. Diana smiled thanking both of them. "maybe one of the men knew where the lower dungeon was" Sebastian suggested. they asked the prisoners one by one but no clue. the girl didn't lose hope; sooner or later the castle would fall and she would have all the time to search for him afterwards. if they survived first...
"all right we need to get to the weaponry, it's on the 4th floor, but we have an issue. Half of the slavers are sleeping in the adjacent quarter and the weaponry itself is probably guarded with spearmen, if we tried to force our way with numbers, we will risk awaking their whole army, facing them all without weapons would be pure suicide. even if we tried to face them with the weapons, most of us are unable to grab a weapon properly, any ideas, girls?" exclaimed Sebastian.
"how about you wear those?" gunnora pointed towards the armour that the guards were, unlike the guard that diana attacked back there the two guarding the prisoners were fully armoured from head to toe, with a Helmet that could only show the eyes, not the whole head of its wearer.
"told you she would come in handy" diana said happily. with that said Sebastian told two other skilled, and former protectors about the new plan. the men nodded, took both the armour and the swords with their pods from the two dead guards, and wore them on themselves. nearly unrecognizable, the men went to achieve their quest.
The guard's POV:
"Hey boys, late shift ?"
"yea, it's our turn now, go pick some rest"
"Alright, we gonna put our armour inside then"
(the two guards went inside the weaponry then after some time they came out without their armour or weapons)
"Good night"
"yea, but not for you" The two men slashed the guards with their swords, stabbing them without mercy, making this night their last. Afterwards, They dragged their still bodies inside the weaponry before returning back to the team.
Back to Diana Pov:
"Nice job men" Sebastian gave them a boost and signalled for the people to move. The prisoners rushed to the weaponry, picking every weapon and armour they saw, and so some brave servants including Gunnora, got ready for the worst.
"Hey, where are you all going, aren't we leaving, the gate is downstairs," asked diana when she saw the prisoners going straight to the guard's quarter.
"Then what next? even if we escaped they could capture us again and again. those butchers are sleeping after they burnt your village and killed and raped many of our women. no one knows how many they will murder or abduct tomorrow. besides none of us will leave until we get our justified revenge for our dead."
She couldn't speak a single word. She already promised him revenge for his family, she gave him a purpose for redemption. She couldn't take it from him now. The only thing she could hope was that he would survive his fury long enough to bury what was left of his family's ashes.
"There is an infirmary at the end of the hall" he pointed, "Go fix your face until we finish them" She opened her mouth to say something but she didn't find the words so she left. She opened the door of the infirmary to reveal a room which has two closets full of medicines and a single bed. She opened one of the 2-window glass closets to face tens of unknown medications with creepy colours. The girl backed a few steps away. She needed some alcohol at least. a bottle which she doesn't know its shape and which one of all those chemicals.
so the girl just washed her face with some water from a sink in the same room and was going to leave empty-handed. But before she left, she saw an interesting drawing on the wall. "Looks like it's a drawing of the castle, let's see here" She studied the diagram keenly, "I FOUND IT!" She said loudly to herself. She couldn't believe that she actually found the lower dungeon place. "It should be under the western tower of the castle, out at the castle parade". Satisfying with what she found. Smiling and proud of herself, she eagerly wanted to deliver the good news to Sebastian.
When she opened the door of the infirmary, she found out that the prisoners were gone from the hall and the guard's quarter's door was opened by a small margin.
Afraid and shaking, the girl took some trembling steps to the door. but when she came closer to the door, she noticed a stream of blood running under the door touching her leg. She was alerted to the warm fluid immediately. Terrified and careful she heard some whispering from the other side. sounds of many people and some strange voices come back and forth. very slowly the girl took a peak...
and regret it...
"that's the last one of them"
"last one in this room, not in the castle, come on we still have..."
The man pointed surprisingly at the girl behind the door, cutting the conversation between him and the protector Sebastian. When Sebastian turned around, his odd calmness escaped him at once as he hasted straight towards the girl.
But it was too late. Her mind had already consumed a horrific sight...
Blood, everywhere...
corpses...
dead on their beds...
slit throats...
Their lifeless eyes staring upwards...
Their mouth is unbelievably open...
Silently, screaming for help...
She slowly stepped back, her energy escaped her body, and her mind stopped working due to the shock. As the poor girl crashes to the ground. The last thing she saw was Sebastian running towards her before passing out...