The Devil's Runner Part 4

“Now, which one of you was mistaken for me?”

Dmitri raised his hand, unable to find his voice in front of the Devil’s Runner. He couldn’t believe that the Devil’s Runner was actually standing before him and not only that, but was saving him from this awful prison. Dmitri hadn’t been here all that long, but it didn’t take long to get sick of this place.

The Devil’s Runner seemed to be appraising Dmitri before saying “I think you’ve been here the least amount of time, can you carry her while I lead you all to safety?”

Dmitri nodded and the Devil’s Runner handed him the woman he had been carrying. Dmitri was startled to see that she looked younger than him. She seemed frightened, so Dmitri tried to be as gentle as he could with her. She was far too light to be healthy. He couldn’t imagine how long she would have had to be here to get into this condition, and she was already so young. Why would someone so young be imprisoned? She refused to look at him and still seemed so scared. Now that the Devil’s Runner was farther ahead, Dmitri found his voice again. “Don’t be scared miss; don’t you know who it is that’s rescuing us? It’s the Devil’s Runner! No one is better than him!”

The girl looked up at him then and hiccupped. Dmitri looked into her eyes for the first time and lost himself in them. He hadn’t ever seen eyes so blue. She blushed and looked away; breaking the trance she had trapped him in. “My but you’re a pretty girl miss,” he said, almost surprising himself at his boldness and making the girl blush more.

The group started moving forward, lead by the Devil’s Runner. He explained that even though he had been able to sneak in, he couldn’t sneak such a large group out, especially when one of them seemed unable to walk, so, he would fight his way out. It would leave a better impression that way he said. None of the ones getting rescued actually saw any of the fighting, as the Devil’s Runner would tell them to wait before running off. He would call to them to follow and then they would see only the aftermath. Sometimes the Devil’s Runner would run behind them and they would hear fighting before he returned.

“The whole place is likely on alert now,” the Devil’s Runner said. “All of you keep as quiet as possible. I need to be able to hear everything.”

All of the escapees became as silent as they could except one. The girl Dmitri was holding was crying and it was steadily getting louder. The Devil’s Runner motioned to Dmitri to keep her quiet, but Dmitri didn’t know what to do. He did the only thing he could do and said, “Please don’t cry miss.”

She stopped suddenly, as if surprised by what he said, but then it got a lot worse. She started shaking and her breathing got faster and shorter. Dmitri was so surprised that he almost dropped her, which of course made it worse. “I think she’s sick!” Dmitri said.

The Devil’s Runner ran toward them and laid his hand on her shoulder, trying to asses the situation, but she started panicking and fighting at Dmitri and the Devil’s Runner. She was very weak, so she couldn’t do any real harm, but she was making a lot of noise. She was becoming hysterical. The Devil’s Runner pulled something out from a hidden pocket that looked like a needle, but before he could do anything with it she passed out.

“Almost more trouble than she’s worth,” the Devil’s Runner said. “Now if only I knew what she was worth, I might be more inclined to make all of this trouble.”

Dmitri wanted to ask the Devil’s Runner what he meant, but a group of guards burst onto the scene, drawn by the girls screaming. The Devil’s Runner sighed and pulled out a blade from his belt. “I had hoped to avoid fighting in front of all of you, mostly because I don’t like anyone to see my style until its too late. Hopefully, I’ll never fight any of you,” he said.

Dmitri stood transfixed as the Devil’s Runner took out all of the guardsmen. He looked like he was getting on in years, but he fought circles around them with nothing but a short blade. Many of the guards fell even without getting hit by his blade. Dmitri couldn’t tell how, but he suspected it had something to do with the needle that the Devil’s Runner had pulled out earlier. It wasn’t long before the guards were all down and the Devil’s Runner was leading them again, his earlier admonition repeated to be as silent as possible.

There were several times when the Devil’s Runner would stop everyone and have them wait, though none of them could tell exactly why. He would have them back up, or he would have them speed up, only to halt suddenly. The Devil’s Runner had to battle twice more before they got near enough to the entrance to see natural sunlight.

The Devil’s Runner had them stop near a turn in the tunnel. He held up his finger to his mouth, again reminding them to be silent, and slowly looked past the corner. He quickly looked back smiling in a way that made Dmitri’s skin crawl. “I came here expecting a challenge and they aim to give me one,” the Devil’s Runner whispered. “All the guards that I haven’t already taken care of have been gathered at the entrance. That’s more men than I’ve ever faced.”

Dmitri wondered if he should be worried, but the smile on the face of the Devil’s Runner quelled his worry. Mush to everyone’s surprise, the Devil’s Runner began scaling the wall and was soon near the roof of the cave. At the shocked faces of the prisoners, he just winked and then crawled across the ceiling, apparently out of sight of the guardsmen. Soon there was a commotion around the corner. Many of the guards started shouting things like “Show yourself!” and “Where is that demon?!”

After a few more moments of commotion they all heard the voice of the Devil’s Runner say, “I am the Devil’s Runner! Did you really believe that you had caught me? Did you think that you could hold me? I am here to break the one you mistook for me out of this hole! All who stand in my way will know the power of the Devil’s Runner!”

Several guards ran right past the prisoners, too scared to notice them. The commotion got worse and many guards started yelling in terror. Dmitri got too curious and sneaked a peak around the corner. There were a lot more guards than Dmitri thought, though a good deal were on the ground. A few of the guards seemed to be going mad, attacking the others, yelling in an insane way. Dmitri looked up to see if he could see the Devil’s Runner was still on the ceiling, but he couldn’t see him anywhere. More and more guards dropped to the floor, and more went crazy and started attacking other guards as the first ones to go mad fell. After a long and terrible battle, all of the guards were on the floor but one, who was panting where he stood. He looked back right at Dmitri, causing him no small fright, but then took of his helmet revealing that he was the Devil’s Runner himself. “Well, that was certainly fun. Now come on you lot, we’ve still got a long way to any sort of civilization.”