After the Storm

27. The light

Burning the late-night oil to write this lol. Hope u all like it!

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Karim stepped into the room with hell's vengeance aflame in his eyes and a blood-stained sabre in his hand. I had never been happy to see the big brute.

"Karim! My man!" I wanted to spread my hands but the blasted ropes were still snaked tightly around me. "Undo me, will you?"

He looked at me in an incredulous way that asked: Why would I release an Ifrit like you?

I glared back threateningly. Because if you don't, I'll haunt you in my afterlife.

He quickly glanced away from me and snarled at Lord Dalgliesh who was definitely less intimidating than yours truly. Despite his mouth being hidden by a black bush, Karim still managed to look intimidating, or even more so.

The blonde shit-dick composed himself and plastered on another of his fake-as-Maria-and-Anne smiles. "How delightful that your servant has come to join us, Rikkard. However, I'm afraid that his intrusion is rather impolite."

"Impolite?" I snorted. "Just like how you tied us to chairs and tried to torture us?"

"Precisely, although I do find myself much more courteous."

"Ha. Ha. Good joke."

"Thank you." He turned his aristocratic smile -- or in other words, the grin of a shark that I saw too often on the faces of upper class men who wanted something from me (such as my hand in marriage. Not that Lord Dalgliesh was keen on wedding the large Mohammedan, but you get the idea, don't you?) -- on the heavily forested mountain of a man.

"Let my Sahib go." He pointed his sabre at our captor and it glinted maroon and silver. I shivered. I wouldn't want to be the one being threatened by that humongous meat cleaver.

"No." His voice was a deadly whisper. Definitely not as threatening as Mr Ambrose's nos, but it held a close second. He raised his voice. "Men!"

Blast! He had reinforcements! That sly dog! Karim seemed to be thinking the same thing, but with less astonishment. He acted quickly, darting towards Mr Ambrose with amazing agility for someone his size, and sliced through the ropes. He handed our employer a gun and his walking stick just in time as approximately twenty soldiers swarmed into the room. Yes soldiers! Not cheap rogues that anyone could pick off the streets. And despite there only being twenty which was no where close to an army, they seemed as intimidating as a hundred. They swallowed up half of the tiny room.

Mr Ambrose stood and brushed himself off. When done, he looked distastefully at the small army. "This is inconvenient."

"Inconvenient? Inconvenient! I'll say that this is more than a mere inconvenience!"

"Indeed, Mr Linton? I don't just see it as an inconvenience but also as a waste of resources." If he were a normal man, he would have scowled at Lord Dalgliesh. "The money used to pay professional troops is exorbitant. Along with having to compensate their families when they get their heads hacked off? A waste of money."

"That's all you can think of before we die?" The army was as surprised as I was at Mr Ambrose's stinginess that they didn't attack. As for Lord Dalgliesh, he was too amused to instruct them to strike, not that that was a bad thing.

"We aren't going to die, Mr Linton. Have a little faith."

"In you or God?"

"Is there a difference?"

Oh the audacity! My annoyance skyrocketed when I remembered that I was still tied up like a pig for slaughter.

Lord Dalgliesh clapped twice sharply. "Enough." His men immediately tensed, ready to charge us upon his command. "Thank your for being of incredible amusement, however it's time for you to go." His smile was of one with no remourse. Not even a smidge of it.