Judith laid under the bed quiet. She felt her heart pulse slowly and steadily and quickly began to beat faster and faster, to a degree that Judith feared the captain would hear the beating of her heart.
To also add onto this, Judith was afraid that the captain would perceive the strong smell of blood permeating into the air.
Judith did her best to hold her wound shut, but as she did so, she suddenly felt something off.
Looking at her hand, she realized that she felt no pain. She meant to investigate by unwrapping her hand, but the captain began to walk around the room, pulling Judith's attention to the grim situation she had found herself in.
Judith kept silent and watched as the captain made his way toward the bathroom, before stopping half way through and turning toward the bed.
Judith tried her best to quell the intense beating of her heart, but all her efforts were like a droplet of water trying to cause a ripple in an ocean.
The captain kept a steady stride toward the bed and with each step, Judith's heart pulsed into her ears, like the pounding of a warning drum.
The captain didn't stop walking, until he made his way to the bed and then stopped in front of it. With his boots just beside Judith, she held her breath, trying every means to not get caught.
She withheld her breathing as the seconds passed by, then, the captain turned away from the bed and made his way to the door. Though the captain's sudden absence from her side had done a small but significant job at calming her down, the tension building up inside of Judith all but jumped through the roof when she saw the cube-like piece of wood that hid the keyhole lie three inches beside the door.
Judith stared at it, praying the captain would not see it, step on it or hit it with the door if he were exiting the room. And as though Judith's prayers were answered, he seemingly didn't see it and definitely did not step on it when the sound of him grabbing the door handle reverberated into the air.
But the last thing still remained, unfortunately, Judith had felt it all but over when the door swung open so fast it was impossible not to hit the cube. But just as the door was a centimeter away from the cube, the captain had spoken "Where the hell did I keep it?!" With a comparatively loud sound that drowned out the small clank the cube made with the door.
And just like that, the captain had exited the room, leaving Judith alone once more.
Judith in the interval of six seconds, let out a sigh of relief, as she found she was safe, at least for the moment. But then, as realization of her current predicament had sunk she, Judith found herself paralyzed more than anything else.
Paralyzed on what had to be done next.
If enough time had passed, no matter how small, Judith could make her way out of the room. That was, should the captain have ventured beyond the hall of the manor in search of what he was looking for.
And by the steady reduction in the volume of his footsteps, it would seem he was going beyond the hall. Which meant that Judith's first question had been answered.
But taking this option would leave another problem.
Being that, if she were to exit the room right now, without fixing the lock, then the captain would know that someone had come into his room. And worst, he would know said person was aware of his secret, at least to a degree.
Which meant that her plan would be ruined.
With the seconds ticking by, Judith made a decision, no matter how stupid.
At once she rolled out from underneath the bed and proceeded toward the table, where she picked out his his knife and made her way to the shelf.
At best she had only a couple of seconds left, at worst his footsteps would be returning now.
Judith didn't have time to linger on this, her decision had been made and she had to stick to it. If push came to shove, and he returned before she could finish, she would just return to confines of underneath the bed and wait for him to use the bathroom, before sneaking out of his room.
Of course, things playing out that smoothly was wishful thinking sprinkled with a hint of luck. But it was all Judith could think of at the moment.
As Judith worked on the keyhole, she had discovered that truly, her arm had been healed. The pain was completely gone and she could feel no wound.
This had to be the second time now. More than anything this confirmed she was blessed with some kind of healing ability.
The wounds she sustained would be gradually healed. Though Judith didn't know how great of a wound her ability could heal or how fast, and she felt reluctant to test this out.
But all in all, she was quite happy for it.
One good thing she had gotten so far upon entering this world.
Not lingering on this longer than she needed to, Judith fixated on the keyhole, which now proved difficult. Not to mention the erratic beating of her heart, which made thinking straight seem like the endeavor of an intoxicated person.
Feeling this eat into her, she shut her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath before exhaling slowly. This simple act had greatly alleviated everything tearing into her sanity.
With this clarity, Judith returned focus to the task at hand. And by some miracle, she had finally finished up. After which she screwed the keyhole in place and returned the knife to the table all in a span of one minute.
What followed on the to do list was to place the cube-like piece of wood in front of keyhole. Judith turned to the door, rushed over to the cube and made her way back to the cupboard as fast as she could.
Upon slotting the cube back into place, Judith wasted no time returning to the door where she stood for just a moment.
After taking one more deep breath, she placed a hand on the handle of the door, then pulled on it slightly, so she could get a good view of the hall without giving away her presence.
Upon staring into the hall and finding nothing and no one and also feeling time breathing down her neck, she sprang out of the door, not giving the captain the chance to return and catch her in the act.
As she stepped out of the room, her soul had forgotten her, when she saw the captain standing beside the threshold, grinning.