The black knight and his two grolls entered the torture room. The light from the torches they carried partly illuminated it, but Lucius and Old Nigel were well hidden behind bigger torture devices, and they remained unnoticed. As soon as the trio passed half of the room, Old Nigel pointed towards the staircase, and Lucius nodded in agreement. They immediately went for it, on the tips of their toes to not cause any noise. It was a horrifying and nerve-wracking experience for Lucius, for he knew that if they only decided to turn around for some reason, all would be lost.
Luckily for them, they didn't, and the pair managed to start going up the staircase before the black knight and the grolls even got to the hallway. As they did so, Old Nigel summoned a small flame so Lucius could see in front of him, and they began to silently run up the staircase. This was a perfect outcome, but at best, it gave them just enough time to get as far away from the dungeon as possible, so they had to be quick, and they were quick indeed. Following the staircase, they quickly arrived at one big bend. After they passed it, it wasn't long before they arrived in front of the dungeon's big metal door. Lucius's heart was beating like crazy, and his body was full of adrenaline. There it was. The door behind which, after a lot of danger, waited his freedom. However, adrenaline soon gave way to desperation when he tried to open it and discovered that it's locked.
"What now?!" he thought in panic.
Luckily for him, he completely forgot about Old Nigel and his ability to unlock and lock doors without keys, so he was shoved aside, and after a second or two, they were out of the dungeon.
"There, that should hold them for a second or two." he said after he locked the door behind them.
He turned around, extinguishing his little flame, and looked Lucius in the eyes and asked:
"Where to, Lucius?"
"To wherever it is, the black knight is keeping his sword." answered Lucius.
He made his choice. It was dangerously unpredictable and hard, but it was a choice of a warrior, while the other choice was a choice of a mindless coward who thinks only of saving himself at any cost. Old Nigel was right. Nobody in his right mind will suspect that he decided to go to the heart of the fortress instead of finding the quickest way to leave its premises as soon as possible. If nothing else, this choice gave him time, which the other one severely lacked.
Old Nigel smiled approvingly, like he wanted to applaud Lucius for choosing wisely, and signalled him with his hand to follow him. They quickly began moving through the halls of the fortress. The fortress itself (at least its halls) reminded Lucius a lot of those from Imp King's castle. They were long and illuminated by lit torches that hanged from the walls. Yes, the stone was of higher quality and of different colour, but the atmosphere was pretty much the same.
What wasn't the same was the design. Imp King's castle was much more cramped and purposefully built for Imp King's personal use. On the other hand, this was a fortress, where a lot of soldiers had to have the ability to freely and quickly move through it. In practice, this meant that the fortress is one big maze of halls and rooms, and Lucius would have undoubtedly gotten lost if he didn't have a guide that knew his way around the place.
They also didn't lack company. Very quickly they came upon guard patrols, always consisting of two grolls. Luckily for them, they didn't seem all that interested in the idea of finding potential intruders, and, honestly, who could blame them? If the fortress wasn't attacked in centuries, they couldn't really hope for any kind of excitement. Because of that, they managed to avoid them pretty easily. They would hide in a nearby hall, and Old Nigel would weaken the strength of the closest torch with his powers, and that would usually be enough for them to remain undetected.
Suddenly, a very loud metallic sound echoed through the fortress's halls.
"It seems that our fellow black knight realised that the dungeon is completely empty, and he rushed to the exit, only to find it locked. Judging by what I know about him, I think he kicked the whole damn thing right out of its hinges. We will be blessed by a violent drum performance any moment now. We have to hurry. Soon these halls will get a lot more traffic than they did in years. Good thing for us is that we nearly arrived at our destination." said old Nigel while picking up the pace.
Lucius followed his example but couldn't help but to ask himself what he meant by that violent drum performance part. He soon got an answer to his question. The sound of drumming echoed through the halls. It was an alarm. The black knight surely ordered for it to be raised. Soon the whole fortress will be looking for him. That wasn't good. That wasn't good at all!
The sound of footsteps—many of them—could soon be heard coming from various directions, and Lucius was expecting a troop of demons to appear in front of them any second now. But that didn't happen.
"They have heard the alarm, but they still don't know what happened. They are rushing to the battlements to find out. That's on the opposite side of the fortress. That's another reason why the escape plan containing stables was a bad idea. Stables were near the battlements." explained Old Nigel.
At that moment, Lucius was even more thankful that he met Old Nigel. There was no way he would have any chances of escaping without him, even if he somehow managed to get himself out of that cell alone. His knowledge of this place was proving to be truly invaluable. Anyway, they soon arrived at a corner, and they both stopped for the same reason. They heard voices behind that corner. That was not good! Very quietly, they sneaked to the corner. They could now clearly hear the whole conversation.
"I think we should go too." said the first rough voice.
"Will you knock it off already?! We have a job, and that job is to guard the black knight's private chamber. We are not a patrol, for devil's sake!" said the second, equally rough voice.
Old Nigel peaked around the corner and confirmed Lucius's suspicions.
"Two grolls. Armed, of course." he whispered to Lucius's ear.
This was really bad. Both he and Old Nigel were unarmed, and they couldn't confront these two, but at the same time, every second they wasted while these two argued was a second closer to being found and captured. This was really, really bad. Old Nigel shrugged, clearly frustrated. He also didn't have an idea how to solve this unexpected and irritating problem.
"But what if we're being attacked? We will miss all the action! You don't want to stand here while others are enjoying themselves, do you?" asked the first groll again.
"You are right. But what if it's not an attack? What if it's something else? We might get punished by leaving our post. Hell, we could lose our heads over that." replied the second one, more worried about the consequences they might face for deserting their post than missing on the action.
Silence. The first one didn't reply. It seemed as if the conversation was over and he gave up. Lucius already began to think that their plan was ruined when the first one spoke again.
"Well, you don't know that, do you? I'll tell you what. We can rush to the battlements to see what's going on. If we're being attacked, we stay there and fight. Protecting this fortress is our duty, is it not? Then, by fighting, we would be also doing our duty."
"And if it's not an attack, we rush back here. Deal?" said the second one, yielding to the persuasion of the first one.
"Deal!"
"Then, let's go!" said the first one as they immediately rushed to the exact corner behind which Lucius and Old Nigel were.
"What now?!" once again, Lucius asked himself, unsuccessfully trying to come up with a plan in such a short amount of time.
Luckily, Old Nigel again had a solution. Using his powers, he completely extinguished the nearby torch, leaving the hall in the dark, and they both lay down on the floor next to the walls.
"Hey, this torch isn't burning!" said the first groll as they both stopped at the corner.
"What? You want to fight, but now you're scared of a burnt torch?" said the second one, ridiculing him.
"I'm not afraid! Let's go!" said the first one, clearly not wanting to look like a coward in front of his comrade.
They ran past Lucius and Old Nigel like they didn't exist. When they went away, the pair got up to their feet and rushed to the door.
"That was clever." said Lucius, honestly impressed by Old Nigel's ingenuity.
"Why, of course it was. After all, I did it." replied Old Nigel, smiling mischievously.
The door was locked, but it was no match for Old Nigel, and, in a moment, it was unlocked and opened. They went into the black knight's chamber and closed the door behind them. It was dark inside. Old Nigel summoned a small flame, and then they both froze in place. The chamber was almost completely empty, except for the throne made out of stone on its other side. Leaning on the throne, there was the black knight's equally black sword. Next to it, on the floor, lay a black wolf as big as a calf! It was sleeping. For now...