Mighty Hammer Down by David J Guyton Page A

set of keys, and he took the
guard’s keys when he left. There had to be another set.
    The only place they could be was in
the desk. There was nothing else in the room. It worried her that
the desk was too far for her to reach while her feet were clamped
so tightly to the floor, but it was close enough to touch, so maybe
she had a shot. She stood up slowly, took a breath and reached out
to the desk, laying her body over it. With her hands tightly
clamped, it wasn’t easy, but she reached down and felt the handle
of a drawer. The guard began to stir.
    As she fumbled to open the drawer, she
knocked over the only candle in the tiny room, plunging it into
darkness. Frustration turned to panic as she found the drawer
locked. In a desperate attempt to find a solution, she felt along
the desk. To her amazement, she found what she was looking for. A
single key hung on a nail on the other side of the desk. She
thanked the gods for her luck.
    The guard made an attempt to speak,
but he was still out of his wits. Her time was running out fast but
she had to be careful and not rush. She could only touch the key
with two fingers. If she dropped it, she would probably never have
a chance like this again. She calmed herself as best she could, and
lifted the key off the nail. Putting it on the desk, she switched
hands and positioned the key so that she could put it in the lock
without dropping it. She stretched as far as she could, which was
causing the shackles to cut into her ankles. Biting her lip against
the pain, she felt for the lock.
    Her panic rose as she heard noises
from outside the room. She didn’t know what was happening, but she
knew she had to hurry. To add to her problems, she felt the guard
touch her leg. He was coming to. She hoped that the darkness would
confuse him and make him think he was waking up in his bed at
home.
    With much relief, the key finally slid
into the lock. It turned and clicked without trouble, and she again
thanked the gods. She opened the drawer with her thumb and groped
for a set of keys, finding instead papers and other small,
unidentifiable objects. She threw everything to the floor, hoping
to find what she was looking for.
    Finally after an eternity of
searching, she grasped a cold metal ring. She jiggled it and it
rang with the glorious sound of brass keys. Carefully pulling them
out of the drawer, she pushed herself off the desk back into the
standing position. Squatting down, she tried several of the keys in
her leg irons. The guard cleared his throat. She thought maybe he
was awake now but unaware of his surroundings. Quietly she tried
the last key. It worked. The tight irons fell off and clanked to
the floor.
    "What…who’s there?" the guard
said.
    She wasted no time. She kicked at the
place she thought his head would be. She got him right under his
jaw, sending him right back to his unnatural slumber. She unlocked
the shackles at her wrists and threw them behind the desk. Bending
down in the darkness she felt for the guard’s sword and pulled it
free of its scabbard.
    Feeling the lock on the door, she
tried a key. This time it worked on her first try. She swung the
door open just enough to peer out. No guards were in the immediate
area, so she opened the door and exited, locking it behind her.
Instead of running aimlessly, she ran back down the narrow corridor
towards her cell. Finding the right key, she opened the door. This
plan had to work.
    She entered the room and stomped over
to the corner. She lifted the chin of the woman chained there face
down. This one would simply not do. Before the woman could ask what
was going on, she went to the other woman in the far corner.
Lifting her chin, she decided that this was a better choice. She
hastily unlocked the woman’s shackles.
    "What’s happening? How did you get the
keys? Are you one of us?" she asked as she looked thankfully
through teary eyes.
    "Quiet. You only have this one chance.
Don’t ask questions," she said as she finished