9. Something warm
Kylanor left soon after to attend to some duties and the two maids stood in awkward silence, both staring at me.
"Is there something on my face?" I asked. They glanced at each other then back at me shaking their heads.
"We are here to serve you." Their voices trembled in unison.
From the way they kept twiddling their thumbs and tugging at their long silk skirts, I could tell that they were scared or at least nervous.
They were scared of me even though I hadn't done anything. Usually, I would have tried to comfort them. But not this time.
Not when I needed them to obey my very words.
Now when I needed to escape this hell hole.
"I ate in silence, the only sounds coming from their sighs and my cutlery hitting the plate.
"I don't have to finish the food right?" I asked and rubbed my belly that looked twice its size now.
"No, we will take the plates out if you want," they announced and stepped forward.
"Okay," I nodded as they piled the plates and leftover of the Chinese food together.
"Wait," I said and they both froze with their backs hunched at the door.
Then slowly, they turned to face me like a reclining office chair.
"I want to sleep," I yawned and stretched my arms lazily with my eyes closed to squeeze some sleepy tears, "so I don't want you to disturb me," I fiddled with my pillows to avoid eye contact, in case my trembling lips gave me away.
"You get what I mean right?" when the silence persisted I asked again.
"Yes, but..."
"If you want to come in and disturb me, that's okay too. I'll just tell Kylanor that you want those 100 lashes as well,"
"We are sorry, Lady. We will serve you from outside your room. You can call us if you need anything," I smiled at the quiver in their voices.
"If you understand, you can leave," I shot out and they scrambled out of the room, plates rattling in their hands.
They exited with a bang of the door, but I couldn't be upset about that. As soon as I confirmed that their footsteps had receded from the hallway, I hurried towards the door and put the locks in place.
It wouldn't be too smart to get out through the main door. There could be guards around. Besides, I haven't been introduced to anyone yet. Who knew, they might take me as an intruder and lock me up.
But the window that was as wide as my own bedroom door provided the perfect escape. Without any barricade, all I needed to do was jump out.
At least, that was what I thought until I peered down and realized something. I might be on the ground floor of this building, but the height from the window to the ground was twice the fence of our house back home.
Too risky.
I needed a ladder. If only I was Rapunzel, I could have let down my hair, but I had a bob with a fringe that hasn't had a comb through it in two days now.
I sighed and planted my hands on my waist as I looked around for anything I could use all to no avail until my eyes landed on the bed and I noticed the unnecessary layers of bedding it had.
Perfect.
In ten minutes, I had tied the ends of the three different beddings securely to the post.
I can do this, I closed my eyes and let the other end out through the window.
I watched it drop to the ground.
Or I expected it to drop to the ground but the end was still at least a meter away from the short blades of grass.
There was nothing else to tie except I wanted to look around the closets which would be an absolute waste of time.
The faster I was done with this, the better. I packed my bags and ensured to tuck my phone in it. Even though there wasn't network here, I couldn't be sure that they were telling the truth.
Maybe, I'll find somewhere to charge when I leave here.
The moment I climbed the window sill, ready to climb down, a strong wind blew, almost pushing me down and at the same time, reminding me of my fear of heights.
But in this life and death situation, my priority was to get out of here alive, so I closed my eyes, gulped down the nausea and started my descent.
I rolled the cloth tightly around my wrist then used my toes as the only point of contact with the wall.
Sliding down was more painful than I imagined, but it was better to bleed voluntarily than against my will.
My eyes remained closed because the wind got stronger, until I reached the tail of the beddings and I got stuck at the last knot.
A fear rose in my heart, because, what if I fell and broke my legs.
Can I do this? I asked myself when I heard howling from a distance.
Was that even stronger wind or the monster beasts?
My heart roared with both fear and strength as I made the resolution to jump down.
I can do it.
I let go of the clothing and landed on a warm steady spot.
Something closed around my feet that for a moment I thought I'd died and woken up somewhere, that was until I heard his voice.
"Careful, you could have gotten hurt from that height without shoes on," Kylanor said, startling me out of my assumed safe landing that I started to wobble on his outstretched palm.
"There there," he stretched his hand away forward so I could fall into his chest.
"Now that was close? What with the beddings though?" He asked as he helped me to the ground.
In all of this, I didn't dare to look him in the eyes.