Soldiers had an unmistakable tone of voice. There were booted footsteps and crisply assertive questions from the guards tramping around upstairs, though Simon couldn’t make out the words. However, the fact that the guard had arrived so quickly seemed to be an ominous development. He presumed he’d killed a man. They were likely here to collect him for execution or for whatever passed for a Hunt here.
He needed to escape.
Given enough time, he thought he could carve his way out of the cage through the wood planks of the ceiling or the bricks of the wall using improvised tools. However, Simon doubted he would be given the leisure to chip away mortar or whittle a hole in pine. A different plan would be needed rather than ‘make a hole and squeeze out.’
Fighting his way to freedom seemed most likely to succeed. Unfortunately, his sword was on a table on the other side of a barrier of thick iron wire.
Simon sniffed miserably and immediately regretted it, as the irritation in his sinuses and throat provoked a sneezing and coughing fit. The towering man with the purple hair had sprayed him in the face with an incredibly potent oil of pepper. Everything burned, and hours later, tears still streamed down his cheeks, and his nose continually dripped. The snot added to the crusted filth on his skin.
There was no water to wash with. Rubbing only made the effects worse.
He could do nothing about the pain, so he turned his attention to the room beyond the cage. It was clearly a mage’s workshop of some sort. Several glowing lights, too white and steady to be a natural flame, hung from the ceiling. Shelves stuffed with random items, ranging from weapons to dolls, plus numerous objects he didn’t recognize, lined the walls. Unfortunately, this wasn't a good time to indulge his scholarly inclinations to study everything for the sake of pure curiosity.
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Simon decided his best odds would be to take them by surprise after the cage door was opened. To do so, he needed to find a way to hide.
The cage contained a desk, a small chest, numerous boxes made of a thick, corrugated brown paper, several paintings leaning against a wall, and assorted objects that he could not identify. One drawer was full of shiny glass and metal rectangles, perhaps a third of an inch thick and a little longer than his hand. A larger device on the desk was hinged like a book. On the inside, one half had a black sheet of glass, and the other was covered in a multitude of buttons with letters printed on them.
Perhaps they were ensorcelled objects? Or art? He did not know. None seemed especially useful, except perhaps as objects to throw.
As a boy, Simon had excelled at hide-and-seek. He was smaller than the Keep’s other children and far more flexible, which allowed him to fit into unexpected places. Once, in his early teens, he’d won several rounds by squeezing into an empty cauldron in the kitchen before the cook found him and raised a fuss.
He lifted the chest’s lid. It was fortuitously empty. Squeezing inside would not have been possible had he weighed even a trace more. He ended up crouched on his shins, arms folded tight to his chest, and head twisted hard to one side. With difficulty, given his position, he stuck one of the metal and black glass objects under the lid, towards the hinge, where it would be hidden from view, to prop it open just enough to allow a crack for air. With tears still running down his face from the irritating spray, Simon settled down to wait.
